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SAPPHO 



A TRAGEDY 



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BY 



STELLA 

/ AUTHOR OF 
'RECORDS OF THE HEART' 'THE KING'S STRATAGEM ; OR THE 
PEARL OF POLAND' ETC. 



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\ 1875 
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LONDON 

TRtFBXER & CO., 57 & 59 LUDGATE HILL 

1875 

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TO 

ADELAIDE RISTORI DEL GR1LLO 

THE GREATEST LIVING TRAGEDIENNE 

®jjis grama is Jlsbicateb 

BY HER DEVOTED FRIEND 
THE AUTHOR 






PROLOGUE. 

For all who out of self an hour can go, 

Into another's heart and feel its woe — 

Its burning wounds, its pains, its pangs unknown 

Its hopes, its joys, its sorrows make their own — 

Whose spirits, softened in the school of Dole, 

Feel finest vibratings of a great soul, 

And all its solemn mysteries solve aright, 

"We lift the curtain of the past to-night. 

Ye're here. With simple mien and eyes aglow, 

And hearts of tempered fire, and souls of snow, 

I see you there mid beauty's proud display, 

Like bright stars seated in the Milky Way. 

The present and its cares behind you cast, 

And live this evening in the classic past ! 

There face to face th' immortal Lesbian meet, 

And hear her pulses throb, her great heart beat ; 

Now softly, joyous as a marriage bell, 

Now sadly, solemn as a funeral knell, 

And ken upon her spirit's stormy sky, 

Reflections of the true divinity. 

Ages ere the star of Bethlehem arose, 

And shook for aye. Olympian Jove's repose. 

See proud Athena), like the Phoenix rise, 

And with her brazen temples prop the skies ; 



VI PKOLOGUE. 

Gardens and groves, th' Acropolis expand, 
Beneath the wise usurper's* fostering hand ; 
Survey the Dionysia — king and sage, 
Poet and peasant in its sports engage. 
High, low, rich, poor, all to one level sunk, 
Pleasure and wit run mad, a nation drunk. 
Next, see before Olympian umpires throng 
The famed disputants for the wreath of song, 
Each holding in his hand a little scroll. 
Then hear old Solon's lofty numbers roll, 
.iEsop, Alceeus, and Stesichorus sing; 
Anacreon, like the skylark on the wing, 
His dewy notes upon the mute air fling ; 
List to Erinna — thrill to Sappho's lyre, 
As through your bosoms runs its quickening fire ; 
Follow her to Olympia — see her crowned — 
The sacred laurel round her temples wound ; 
Then like a falling star, thorns in her crown, 
Into the pitiless Sea of Leucate go down. 

* Pisistratus. 



DRAMATIS PERSONS. 



Phaon, a young Shepherd. 
Alc-SEls, a Poet of Lesbos. 
Pisistrattjs, King of Athens. 
Phalaris, King of Agrigentum. 
Solon, the Athenian Lawgiver. 
iEsop, the Fabulist. 
Thespis, the Tragedian. 
Stesichortts, Lnventor of the Chorus. 
Anacreon, Lyric Poet. 
Theognis, Poet of Magara. 
Ibyctjs, Poet of Ltaly. 
MixEHirus, Poet of Ionia. 
Charaxtts, Brother to Sappho. 
Cxrrrs, a Harper, and Slave to Sappho. 
Cosmo, an Emissary of Pisistrattjs. 
Soothsayer, a Slave to Sappho. 
Apollo. 

sJLo^tfMUylme. G 1 £ (3 WR , l^ f€**]4 

Ehodope, her Nurse. 

Erestna, 

Athis, 

Anactoria, 

Nasldica, 

Unica, and 

GONGYLA, ' 

Doeicha, a Slave 

Venus. 



Pupils of Sappho. 



Officers — People — Sailors — Slaves. 



Scene of Act I., Mitylene ; of Acts LI. and LIL, Athens; 
of Act IV., Sicily; of Act. V., Ionia. 



SAPPHO 



ACT I. 



SCENE I. 

A room in Sappho's house at Mityhne. Busts of Homer, Apollo, 
and the Muses in niches. Lyres, harps, and lutes around a 
table, centre. Enter Erinna. Athis, Unica, Gongyla, Anac- 
torta, and Nasidica, right, with flowers, and take their places 
at the table. 



sappho (entering, left, with a branch of myrtle 
in her hand) 

Good morn, dear pupils, each a sweet good morn, 
And many sweet thanks for these smiles of Flora, 
Which pnt to flight unwelcome melancholy, 
And shrive my heart. 

Ye have been to the concerts of the birds — 
Sweetest sopranos, tenors, and contraltos — 
Essay to weave their melody in verse 
For this day's lesson : 

Bring me the soul of song in chastest garb, 
And not a corpse bedecked with gaudy tinsel : 
Now court the Muses with the poet's ardour, 
Whilst I go forth to watch the eagle's flight. 
s, [She pauses at Homer's bust, at left door 



2 SAPPHO. [act i. 

ATHIS 

These lessons are not worth the time they kill. 

UNICA 

My thoughts are not obedient to my will. 

GONGYLA 

Before I came to Sappho's school my thoughts 
Ran into poetry as naturally 
As music flows from lark's mellifluent throat ; 
Now with a hesitating step they come, 
Like cur bless coursers to receive the bit. 

ANACTORIA 

Song never was and never can be taught. 
Think'st if Alcgeus had been Homer's pupil 
He could create a second Iliad ? 
No more than I can write an Odyssey 
Because I'm pupil of the Sapphic Muse. 

ATHIS 

If Sappho be a Muse, I am a, goddess. 

ANACTOKIA 

Tenth Muse the poets of the time have styled her. 

ATHIS 

Her gold, and not her genius, bought that title. 
Before she wed the merchant prince of Andros 
The critics could not hear the Lesbian's lyre ; 
Its golden strings then made such wondrous music, 
All Greece got drunk on joy, and cried ' Tenth Muse ! ' 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 3 

ANACTORIA 

Alcseus always praised the Lesbian's song. 

ATHIS 

Alcoeus is a hoary doting fool, 

As old men always are when they're in love. 

'Tis known when Sappho wedded Cercolas 

For gold — not love — Alcseus went stark mad, 

Upset the tables, beat to death his servants, 

Spnrred on his steeds till they fell dead beneath him, 

And played the devil till her husband left her, 

And Pittacus, to save her reputation, 

Sent him to Egypt. 

ERINNA 

Silence ! her name is written on the stars 
In letters that will live as long as they. 

ATHIS 

List to the champion of the Lesbian's fame ! 
She pleads her case like lawyer double-fee'd. 
All Mitylene swear that Sappho's mad : 
What good can rumour of a woman say 
Who writes more love-songs than Anacreon ; 
Spends half her nights in babbling with the stars, 
And gives the other half to clamorous lovers ? 

erinna 

I'll hear no more against our noble Sappho, 
Who is as chaste as Dian — great as Homer. 

ATHIS 

As great as Homer 1 
Of poetry she knows no more than I : 
b 2 



4 SAPPHO. [act 

She writes no better poetry than I ; 

Yet, yesterday, she cut and slashed my poem 

Until beginning had it none, nor ending. 



So slashed she mine. 



NASIDICA 
UNICA 

She tore mine into pieces. 



GOXGTLA 

She struck mine out with one dash of her pen. 

ANACTORIA 

A day agone I wrote an ode to Love 

The which she ground to powder twixt her fingers. 

ATHIS 

She is an envious pedagogue. I hate her. 

EEINNA (rising') 

Silence, ungrateful maids ! Poor half-fledged bard- 
lings, 

Whose lyres will ne'er be heard in Fame's proud 
temple. 

Posterity will only know you as 

The pupils Lesbian Sappho loved and taught. 

Doth she not shelter, feed you, teach you gratis ? 

Toil like a slave to purge your minds of darkness, 

And fill them with th' eternal light of Zeus ? 

Great, high-souled Sappho ! envied, slandered, and 

Misunderstood by those who ought to know 

Thee best, and prize thee more than wealth of Croesus, 

I love thee with a reverential love 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 

That I can only feel for one who wears 
The mantle of Divinity. 

Sappho (rushing forward) 
Erinna, guardian angel of my fame, 
I honour, love thee for thy sense of justice ! 

[To her puj 
My generous pupils, I will not detain you, 
Retire, and bring me each an ode on slander. 

['Exeunt pupils. 
Erinna, let me weep upon thy bosom : 
I heard that colocution — let it pass. 
It cut into my soul — but let it pass ; 
It is the price of fame. 

I have stood face to face with Death — but Slander, 
Ingratitude, are foes more terrible : 
Death strikes and leaves us conscious of no ill — 
They deeper stab, and stab, but do not kill. [Sobs. 

ERINNA 

Sappho, Apollo's darling, do not weep, 

An army of such babblers could not harm thee. 

SAPPHO 

Erinna, purest, best Erinna, I 

Am not impervious to the beggar's frown. 

I am so organised, so finely strung 

To all the higher harmonies of being, 

The sting of Zeus's smallest, creeping thing 

Can shake my soul into its very centre. 

ERINNA 

Methought the poet's world revolved so far 
Above this world he heard nor felt its motion. 



6 SAPPHO. [act i. 

SAPPHO 
The poet fills the largest human orbit. 
As is the ocean to the streams that form it, 
So is the poet to his fellow-kind — 
His nature holds a myriad of smaller beings. 
Was not old Homer mightier far than Troy, 
And all the Grecian hosts that girt her round ? 
Combined, they could not lift the grand old bard, 
But in his mighty mind he took them up 
And, battling, set them on the heights of Fame 
For centuries unborn to gaze upon. 

ERINNA 

What is this power that overreaches Jove's ? 

SAPPHO 

Poetry is the lightning of great souls, 
Which Jove-appointed poets chain in words 
And set unto the music of the spheres. 

ERINNA 

Then is the Lesbian happy — 

SAPPHO 

O Erinna ! 

ERINNA 

What more wouldst ask of Heaven than be a poet, 
Jove's chosen chainer of immortal fires ? 

SAPPHO 

Food for my famished heart — undying love. 

ERINNA 

Thou art Apollo's darling — heiress of Jove. 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 7 

SAPPHO 

Alas ! I starve upon such pabulum. 

EKIXXA 

Hellas adores thee. 

SAPPHO 

That is adoration 
Which stimulates, but does not satisfy. 

EPJXXA 

Erinna loves thee — is not this enough ? 

SAPPHO 

Sweet, artless child ! Thy love to Sappho's heart 
Comes like the perfume of a vernal flower — 
It soothes and calms, but does not nourish it. 

EPJXXA 

Alcaeus loves the Lesbian more than life. 

SAPPHO 

Alcaeus doth not understand love's meaning 

Within my heart's interpretation of it. 

A pretty face, a soft bewitching smile. 

A fairy hand bewilder him an hour, 

Then lie upon bis memory like dead perfume : 

I seek a deep and all-abiding love, 

That could not see a hump upon my back 

Though it were large as Atlas : love whose eyes 

Would vest me with the charms of Aphrodite 

Though 1 were hideous as the hag of»Endor ; 

A love whose fires shall burn as jvild as i£tna*> ; 

A love whose light shall warm and thrill like Sdl's ; 



8 SAPPHO. [act i. 

A love whose power shall hold my soul at anchor, 
And leave me nought in heaven or earth to crave. 



ERIXNA 

Such love is but for gods. 

SAPPHO 

Such is for mortals. 
Last night I dreamed I sat beside the sea 
Gazing upon the full round moon above me, 
When twixt me and her face a youth appeared 
With form and features radiant as a god's. 
His golden hair, luxuriant as a woman's, 
Flowed backward from his Adonean brow, 
And from the liquid azure of his eyes 
Flashed fires that burned into my soul. Approaching, 
With matchless grace he dropped upon his knee, 
And in a voice that was all music, said — ■ 
' Immortal Sappho ! at thy feet I lay 
The adoration that thy songs inspire. 
To Athens come, and I will be thy slave.' 
My future's interwoven with that youth — 
I will consult the gods, and know the truth. 
To-day from Athens I await Alcasus, 
Who shall depeint me all the Athenian youths — 
What if he prove the young Anacreon 
With whom I am already half in love ? 

EEINNA 

The youth is but the phantom of thy dream. 

SAPPHO 

When Reason nods the spirit oft steals forth 
To try its pinions on the soul's highways : 



$ 
SCEXE I.] SAPPHO. 

This was some mighty soul of fire unsphered, 
That in its meteor flight flashed on my vision, 

ERINNA 

Thou wert asleep, and therefore couldst not see it. 

SAPPHO 

My spirit from its prison-house had stolen 

In quest of larger spheres of thought and feeling, 

EEINNA 

Dost thou believe the soul can leave its temple 
Ere that Jove send revokeless summons for it ? 

SAPPHO 

High, restless souls that long to look beyond 
Narrow horizons of their bounded visions, 
Will from their tabernacles find egress, 
And, spanning space, confront omniscient Jove. 

ERINNA 

Dost think the spirits of the dead return ? 

SAPPHO 

The air, from heaven to earth, and earth to heaven, 
Is full of spirits. 

ERINNA 

Where ? I nothing see ! 

SAPPHO * 

As the blind see not the visitants who come 
To minister unto their needs, but through 
The ear take in the finest shades of meaning, 



10 SAPPHO. [act i. 

Through sense auricular we viewless hold 
Communion with the spirits of the air — 

father ! Mother ! Child ! I hear your pinions, 
And feel your love descend into my heart 

As dew into the parched lips of the flower ! 

ERINNA 

1 nothing hear, and fear that thou art mad. 



SAPPHO 

If this be madness, then is madness bliss, 

Jove's wisest disposition of our wits 

When Fate hath driven our bark upon the quicksands, 

And all our household gods are lost. Erinna ! 

If I could put a tongue into my woes, 

And make them speak, they'd break thy gentle heart ; 

If I could turn thine eyes into this bosom, 

And make them see the wreck and ruin there — 

The lonely wastes, the herbless tracts of sorrow, 

The desolation wrought by ruthless wrong, 

The pent up fires that make its heaven a hell — 

Thy life would flow away in piteous tears. 

But for one star to me this world were starless — 

[Falls on her knees and points to an aureola. 
Behold ! 'Tis Peace descending in my heart ! 
My soul, wide-lipped, imbibes its holy light — 
It is the star that will eclipse the night ! 

rhodope (entering) 
Sapphie, Alcseus is arrived — 

Sappho (rising) 

Alceeus ! 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 1 1 

EHODOPE 

Ay, ay, Alcseus, smiling- like a boy ; 
Methinks at sight of thee he'll die of joy. 
Dus^y, and travel-worn right from the sea,. 
Like prisoned bird uncaged, he flew to thee. 

SAPPHO 

Swift let the dear old eagle perch before me. 

[Exit Rhodope. 
How nrach I've suffered since I saw Alcseus ! 
How many sorrows and misfortunes known 
Since Pittacus thrust half the earth betwixt us ! 

Enter Alc^ius. She flies into Ids arms* 
Alcseus ! dearest ! 

ALGOUS 

My divinity ! 
My star amid the storm on land and sea I — 
Ami awake, ye gods ? Is this the Lesbian 
I hold against my wildly beating heart ? 
Or some fair phantom of a cruel dream ? 
Let me look in thy face — thy love-lit eyes, 
And taste the rosy nectar of thy lips. 
It is indeed my Muse I — sun, moon, and stars 
Put out your lamps ! Her smile illumes the world. 
Erinna ! How thou'st grown since last I saw thee ? 

SAPPHO (sohhing) 
In thy long absence she has been my friend — 
My sweet condoler in the vale of tears. 

ALCJJUS 

The gods propitious to Erinna be ! 



12 SAPPHO. [act i. 

SAPPHO 

Now on sweet restful couch recline, Alcseus, 
And glad my ears with wildest tales of travel ; 
Depeint old Nile, and Egypt's dusky daughters — 
Sicily, Athens, and the Athenian court — 
My soul's athirst for something new and strange. 

ALC^us (reclining) 
Thou dost ask much of one so travel- weary. 

SAPPHO 

Erinna, dearest, order wine and fruit. [Exit Eeinna. 
A little wine will set thee up, Alcseus, 
And make thy tongue as nimble as of yore. 

ALOffiJUS 

The sweetest wine that Hebe ever poured 
To please the palates of Olympian gods 
Would equal not the nectar of thy presence — 
The balmy, breathing incense of thy smile — 
The inebriating music of thy voice. 
I only ask to sit, and look at thee, 
And dream of love — and love's divinity 
Till envy, wrong, dissension, strife depart, 
And leave the sweet millennium of the heart. 
O violet-crowned, pure, sweetly- smiling maid ! 
The glory of the lyre ! by Jove arrayed 
In all that fascinates, allures, inspires, 
Fling not back on my heart its deathless fires 
That shut lip in my bosom through long years, 
Like ^Etna's flames, have fed and throve on tears ; 
But unto me thy priceless heart- wealth give, • 
And in thy hallowed presence let me live, 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 13 

The happiest man that Hymen ever knew, 
Or sweet food from the shrine of Venus drew ! 



Re-enter Ebinna, followed by a Slave with 
wine and fruit. 

SAPPHO 

Here is our isle's best wine ; Alcseus, drink. 

ALGOUS {drinking) 
May Venus to the Lesbian be propitious, 
And twine her second nuptial knot with myrtle ! 

SAPPHO (drinking') 
Upon Aleasus may the goddess smile, 
And strew his path with Hymen's sweetest flowers ! 
Now, for old Xile. 

ALOffiUS 
With Egypt I was charmed — 
With Isis and Osiris all enchanted. 
Half way to Heaven I scaled the Pyramids, 
And from the pinnacles of demigods 
Surveyed the wonders of Sesostris' Land. 
Beneath me gazed upon the horrid Spliynx — 
Fell shaper of the fate of CEdipus — 
But Theba, with her hundred brazen gates, 
And troops of black-eyed beauties took me captive 
And had my heart been free from Sapphic spell, 
With Theba I had been content to dwell. 

SAPPHO 

Enough of Egypt's sirens. Paint the tempest 
That cast thee on the coast of Sicily — 
I like the grandeur of a storm at sea. 



14 SAPPHO. [act i. 

ALC^US 

With prosperous sail and hearts elate with joy, 

We fast were making Agrigentum's port, 

When from Olympus Jove let loose his thunder ; 

Wrapt the blue Leaven in intermittent flame, 

And rocked the ocean like an infant-cradle ; 

Shook from the yards the pallid mariners, 

And swept away the mizzen like a straw. 

A little while the staunch ship braved the tempest, 

Parried its blows like skilful duellist, 

Then, staggered, reared, and pitched, like frighted 

steed, 
Rolled on her beam-ends, like a vanquished wrestler, 
And, with a wail that startled hell, went down. 

SAPPHO 

O wondrous picture ! Living, breathing, speaking, 

Loud as the seahounds howled above her grave ! — 

I'd barter half the sweetest life to see 

The death of such a ship in such a sea — 

To fight a duel with such enemy, 

'Twould woof my song with realistic beams — 

Nerve, sinew, daring, never born of dreams. 

Why is old Homer greatest of all poets ? 

Because he mingled in the battle's din, 

And trod the sheaf-strown harvest-fields of Death ; 

Measured the statures of full-blooded passions — 

Souls high as heaven — and low as lowest hell — 

Go on, Alcseus, Pegasus I've tied 

ALC^US 

Upon a spar, at last, I reached the shore, 

And found me in the palace of Plialaris, 

Who, though a savage, proved a sovereign friend : 



SCENE I.J 



SAPPHO. 15 



Fed me and clothed me ; watched my fevered couch 

And when the gods restored to me sweet health, 

Showed me his bull wherein he roasts his victims, 

Read me his letters, models of high art, 

Led me np loftiest towers at eve to view 

Mad iEtna vomit fire : 

And with true princely hospitality, 

Sent me to Athens in his royal galley. 

SAPPHO 

Go on ; I'm hungry for Athenian news. 

Discourse of Athens and Pisistratus, 

And all the handsome gallants at his court. 

ALC.EUS 

Athens is growing 'neath the Tyrant's hand : 

Gardens he's built beyond th' Acropolis 

Wherein the youths of Athens fence and wrestle ; 

A temple to Olympian Jove commenced ; 

One to Apollo ; one to Dionysus ; 

A library collected ; schools established ; 

And now is bringing Homer's soul to light. 

SAPPHO 

The gods protect the Poet's royal friend ! 

ALOE US. 

The Tyrant is beset by many foes : 

Old Solon and his laws he has adopted, 

But old Megacles is his enemy, 

Because he will not share his daughter's couch, 

And rear up kings from that accursed stock : 

Anon he'll join the party of Lycurgus, 

And hurl the Tyrant from th' Athenian throne. 



16 SAPPHO. [act i. 

SAPPHO 

Now, let us have a portrait of the man. 

ALOHUS 

Pisistratus is neither tall nor short, 
Heavy nor lithesome, handsome, nor ill-favoured, 
But full broad-browed, broad-chested, like a Spartan, 
And looks the warrior twice more than the king. 

SAPPHO 

A portrait capitally drawn. Go on, 
Old bard. 

ALC2ETJS 

The tyrant is ambitious 
To make his court the cynosure of Greece, 
And in his diadem of glory set 
The brightest stars of art and poetry. 
Now, dwelling at his < ourt are painters, poets ; 
The young Anacreon 

SAPPHO 

Anacreon ! 
How looks he ? Is he handsome, straight, crook'd 

hunched, 
Azure-eyed, gold en -haired, Apollo-like ? 

ALC^US 

He's straight when he's not drunk, which being often, 
He's often crook'd. His hair and eyes are dusky ; 
His nose large, pugged, and winey 



SAPPHO 

Draw the others. 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 17 

ALC^US 

Stesichorus is handsome, tall, and stately ; 
Theognis hoary ; ^Esop short and hunched ; 
Solon stont ; Thespis withered ; Ibycus 
Yonng, nectar-lipped ; Minermns Adonean. 

SAPPHO 

Go on ! I'm dying ! 

ALC^TJS 

Agrigentum's stern, 
Stoic, and savage-looking as his deeds. 
Hath a high brow, lantern jaws, hooked nose, wide 

month, 
Teeth long, thick, yellow, like a cannibal's, 
And always has his bull upon his lips. 

sappho {aside to erinna) 
My phantom's not among the portraitures. 

ALC^TJS 

But I forget Pisistratus' commands. 

I am the bearer of his royal summons 

For Sappho to attend the Dionysia, 

And with the bards of Greece contest the laurel. 

SAPPHO 

A summons from Pisistratus to Atheus ! 



ALOEUS 

His royal galley waits thee in the bay 
Kolus willing, we'll depart to-day. 
c 



18 SAPPHO. [act i. 

SAPPHO 

Now am I happy ! Now will see Athenge ! 
The Court, Pisistratns, Theognis, Solon, 
Stesichorus, the famed Anacreon, 
And with them at the games contest the laurel— 
What if I win it, dear Alceeus, what ? 

ALOffiUS 

Why, kneeling in the temple of Olympia, 
The umpire on thy brow shall set the crown 
Of glory, and amid the acclamations 
Of Greece assembled I will lead thee forth. 

SAPPHO 

Erinna must go too. 

ALC.EUS 

And so she shall. 

SAPPHO 

gods ! receive my thanks, and bless Alcseus 

For this most unexpected happiness ! 

Erinna, sweetest, hasten to Charaxus, 

And warn him to come hither for leave-taking : 

Apprise my pupils of my swift departure, 

And bid my slaves be ready at the tide 

To follow me to Athens in my galley : 
Then, tell my soothsayer I'd speak with him. 

[Exit Erinna. 
Alcseus dear, one favour ere we go. 
You know Charaxus, youngest of our house, 
And of my brothers dearest to my heart : 
With one Doricha. an Egyptian slave, 
Whom recently he purchased on the Nile, 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. I 9 

He is in love, and wills, I fear, to wed : 
Dissnade him from an act so blemishing. 



ALC^IUS 

I'd try to swim old Styx if Sappho bade it ; 
But if Charaxus will to wed Dorieha, 
Olympian Jove cannot avert the act. 
I know the fatal spell of her dark beanty 
Upon man's heart : within her coil she's held 
Half royal Egypt. Love will brook no curb, 
Else had I pat it on him long ago. 
I'm not Alcasus — I am Sappho, or 
A thing so chained to her I seem the same. 
My slumbering lyre wakes only to her bidding ; 
My heart, my pulse beat not for me, but her ; 
'Tis not my soul that holds this house of clay, 
But hers that rules it with a regal sway. 
My feuds with Pittacus ; my feats in battle ; 
Long years of exile ; rovings in strange lands 
O'er pathless seas, confronting death and dangers, 
Were streams wherein I sought to slake the fires 
That, gnawing^ burned into my heart of heart ; 
But time, tide, ocean failed to quench the flame : 
If to the stars I looked, there were thine eyes: 
If on the flowers I gazed, there were thy smiles : 
If in my heart I turned my tearful glance, 
There was thine image sitting at the altar. 
glorious Sappho ! matchless Muse divine ! 
Now end my sorrows at the nuptial shrine ! 

SAPPHO 

Alcaeus, dear, my father's friend, and mine, 
Without thy smile the world would lampless be — 
c 2 



20 SAPPHO. [act i 

ALCJ1US 

Then thou dost love me ? Oh ! at last, at last, 

I've won the prize of Greece. The youngest Muse, 

Apollo's darling, heiress of Olympus. 

Oh ! let me kneel to thee : let me adore thee, 

My light, my life, my soul, my Deity ! 

Say, only once, ' I love thee,' and my heart 

Shall set it to the music of thy voice, 

And sing it in the concerts of the angels. 

SAPPHO 

1 love thee best of mortals. 

ALCMTJS 

O ye gods, 
Let me not die of joy upon joy's brink ! 
And thou wilt wed me ? 

SAPPHO 

If I ever wed 
Again, my father's friend shall be my bridegroom. 

ALGOUS 

Omnipotent ruler of both heaven and earth, 

At last thou'st heard and answered my sole prayer. 

Accept my thanks and boundless gratitude 

For this thy greatest and most precious gift. 

SAPPHO 

Alcseus, good Alcasus, bear with me : 
Be patient with my foibles and my fancies : 
I am a wayward child -ill understood 
Of men, and oft a stranger to myself; 



SCENE I.J SAPPHO. 21 

But, wherewithal, endowed with love of justice 

Aud duty, Jove alone can comprehend. 

I would not wrong thee for the wealth of Crcesus, 

Xor trifle with thy great heart's noble passion ; 

But, urge nie not to don the nuptial chain : 

It was so heavy in my younger days ; 

So galling wore into my soul's fine quick, 

I fear I could not wear it with meet grace 

Ere friendly Time have medicined its wounds : 

Meantime, let me lean on thy generous love, 

And look up to thee as my demigod. 

I am so lonely in this world of woe ; 

So many faithless reeds have broke beneath me, 

That I could worship one firm, faultless staff. 

ALOUUS 

I will not urge thee to the nuptial altar : 
I have thy promise, and will wait thy time. 
Lean on my love, mine honour, all thy weight. 
It would be light, though fifty times as great. 
Henceofrth, on land or sea, whate'er the weather, 
The desert of this life we'll walk together. [E:dt. 

sappho (hieeiing) 
Hear me, almighty Jove ! This is a moment 
Upon whose dizzy pinnacle I tremble, 
And heavenward stretch my suppliant hands to 

thee ! 
Steady my footsteps, and around me fling 
The sacred mantle of divinity ! 

Illumine my way with new-trimmed lamps of wisdom 
That I may see the dangers lurking there, 
And how to walk in harmony with thee ! 
Thrust thy strong arm 'twixt me and secret foes — 



22 SAPPHO. [act i. 

Envy and hate, and all their horrid brood, 
That at each upward step, like hungry wolves, 
Bound from their hiding-places to devour 
And tear in shreds the bold and daring climber ! 

SOOTH, {entering') 
Lady, I'm here in answer to thy bidding. 

SAPPHO 

Dost thou foresee the end of all these things ? 

SOOTH. 

With these old time-dimmed eyes I nothing see ; 
But to my spirit's vision all is clear. [Aside. 

Would that I could not see, or she were wise ! 

SAPPHO 

Why then, old seer, dost hesitate ? Go on ! 

SOOTH. 

At the Athenian court awaits thee homage 
Such as the Queen of Sheba ne'er received. 

SAPPHO 

Amidst the crowd beholdst a fair-haired youth 
On bended knee ? 

SOOTH. 

Oft on his knee I see him. [Aside. 
Oh ! that the gods had ta'en him at his birth ! 
Men clothed in beauty's garb are beauty's foes, 

SAPPHO 

Upon whose brow will fall the laurel ? 



SCENE *.] SAPPHO. 23 

SOOTH. 

Sappho's : 
'Fore bards and Greece, assembled at Olympia, 
The Lesbian will be crowned. 

SAPPHO 

Enough, they come. 

Re-enter Algous, Erinna, and Pupils, right ; Char- 

axus, Doricha, and Slaves, left. 
Thou'rt bold, Charaxus, to confront me with 
Thy slave. 

charaxus 
My slave ! Was beauty e'er a slave ? 
She had her birth in heaven, and is as free 
To shed her quickening light abroad as Sol. 
My heart was dead until Doricha smiled 
On it ; then, as the Phoenix from its ashes, 
It leaped up, quivering with eternal life. 

SAPPHO 

To-day, at tide, I leave our native Lesbos, 
And by all laws of Jove forbid your union ! 

CHARAXUS 

And by all laws of Jove I thee defy, 

And to my bosom clasp my love, my light, my life. 

SAPPHO 

Fear'st not to clasp the serpent of old Nile ? 



CHARAXUS 

Sappho, I nothing fear from thee nor thine ! 
I love Doricha — and Doricha's mine ! 



24 SAPPHO. [act i. 

ALCvEUS 

Charaxus, it were better not to wed her. 

CHAEAXUS 

Not for the wealth of Croesus I'd forego it. 

SAPPHO 

By heaven, Charaxus, if thou wed'st that siren 
Brother of mine I never more will call thee ! 

CHARAXUS 

Doricha's more to me than worlds of Sapphos ! 

sappho (to her pupils) 
Doubtless ye bring me each a noble poem. 

PUPILS 

We could not write upon the theme you gave us. 

SAPPHO 

'Tis strange ! You talked exceeding well upon it ! 

With good Alcseus I depart to-day, 

In answer to a summons from Pisistratus 

To tend the Dionysia at Olympia, 

And with the bards of Greece contest the laurel. 

Much time and gold I've spent to prune your minds, 

A.nd sow in them the seeds of lofty thought ; 

To teach you virtue and a chaste deportment — 

The art of beauty's most approved adornment. 

To-morrow to your several homes return, 

And practise on the lessons yeVe received : 

Study self-conquest — how to draw the curb 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 25 

Upon your tongues when they 'fore reason rnn ; 
What thoughts become a modest maid to utter ; 
How much to say, and how much not to say, 
And learn that victory over self is glory 
Greater than over mighty armies. 
Of poesy I little more can say : 
Who hath within his soul most poetry 
Is highest, greatest, nearest unto Jove ; 
And who hath none is an oblivious being, 
Not worth a place in Nature's harmony. 
Athis, and Anactoria, Nasidica, 
Unica, and Gongyla, fare ye well ! 



pupils (kneeling) 
Sappho, forgive us ! 

SAPPHO 

I forgive ye all, 
And may the gods be mindful of your weal ! 

[Exeunt all but Sappho, tvho takes up her golden 
bjre and violently sweeps the strings. 
Oh, I must drink of Lethe or go mad ! 
Clitus, come in, and play my nerves to sleep, 
Ere I entrust me to old Neptune's arms ! 

l Clitg:s enters with his harp and plays to her while 
she reclines on a couch with her fingers straying 
listlessly over her lyre strings. 
Thou mak'st thy harp talk like a lovelorn soul 
Drunk on Nepenthe. Its discoursings run 
Solemnly beautiful and love-awaking. [Aside. 

O gods ! wherefore this heart-hunger ? This 

gnawing, 
Insatiable cankerworm ? — 
Play not another note, or thou wilt madden me ! 



26 SAPPHO. [act t. 

CLITUS 

Thy will is law, Muse. 

SAPPHO 

Call my soothsayer, 
Then hold thyself apart, and silently. [Enter Sooth. 
What is my future ? Is it hell or heaven ? 

sooth. 
Lady, methinks 'tis both : sometimes the one, 
Sometimes the other. 

SAPPHO 

An s wer with precision . 
Hath Jove created for my soul a twin, 
Or made me lone and orbless as the comet ? 

SOOTH. 

More like the comet, lady, than ought else — 
Fashioned to win the world's wild wonderment. 

SAPPHO 

Is Venus favourable to my dream ? 

SOOTH. 

Knit-browed, the ireful goddess views thy phantom, 
And Cupid laughs to scorn thy love-sick longings. 
Thou wert not made for love, nor love for thee ; 
Give all thy thoughts to Jove and poesy. 

SAPPHO 

Go, get thee gone ! 

sooth, (aside, going) 
Unwelcome truths wear stings. [Exit. 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 27 

sappho (sadly) 
I know that my inheritance is song — 
From my far heavenward-reaching soul. I know it — 
And that I am coheiress with the Mne ; 
Bnt do I hold my birthright in Parnassus 
Upon rendition of all priceless heart-wealth ? 
No, no ; Jove is too great for bartery ; 
Too high to trade upon his holiest gifts ! 
Poesy from Eros is a boon apart : 
One is food for the heart, the other the soul ; 
The one belongs to earth, the other heaven — 
CI it us, art there ? 

CLITUS 

Ay, Muse, 

SAPPHO 

My heart's on fire, 
Flaming like a shut-up hell new faggot-fed ; 
And I must forth to supplicate Astarte 
To put it out. 

Follow me at a distance — touch thy harp 
Only when I'm dead drunk on weal or woe. [ Exeunt. 



28 SAPPHO. [act i. 



SCENE II. 

An arm of the sea. A cluster of myrtles in the foreground. 
An altar to Venus, right, surmounted by a statue of the 
goddess. One to Apollo, left, surmounted by a statue of the 
god. Sappho's house on an eminence, right. Two galleys, 
bearing the ensigns of Athens and Lesbos at anchor. Young 
Lesbians dancing, centre, to the music of Clittjs's Harp, played, 
without. Sappho enters, right, softly sweeping the strings of 
her lyre. The Music ceases. Young L'sbians retire, right. 



SAPPHO 

This is the hour when Paphian dreams are born, 

The beings of the brain take sense and shape ; 

The hour when tender thoughts come trooping home 

Into the mind like little nestling doves ; 

The solitary heart flings wide its door, 

And waits the coming of some' genial guest ; 

When into some great soul I'd merge my soul, 

And in a dream of Eros lose myself. 

How softly beats the downy pulse of Nature ! 

How sweet her sleep, how tranquil her repose ! 

It is as if o'ercome by bliss expectant, 

She'd swooned into the amorous arms of Night. 

Ah ! could this bosom know such holy rest 

As wrap her slumbers round, how blest were I ! 

But deep down in my heart an ^Etna burns, 

Whose fires, like thwarted serpents, lash their craters, 

And hiss and sting, and sting and hiss for ever. 

[She hieels at the altar of Venus. 
Celestial goddess, daughter of great Jove ! 
Fair Queen of Love, and mother of sweet Hymen, 
Whose beauty draws all heaven into thy train, 
And holds the conquering gods in hopeless bonds, 
Give ear to love- sick Sappho ! 



SCENE II.] SAPPHO. 29 

Swift from thy myrtle-wreathed throne descend, 

And medicine a heart diseased, 

Dying of famine in the sight of plenty. 

For every month Jove hath provided food ; 

For every sonl some fount to slake its thirst ; 

For every flower some cup of honey-dew. 

The grass draws milk from Earth's maternal bosom ; 

The thirsty leaf drinks from the lips of Heaven ; 

The appetent worm feeds free at Nature's table — 

And hath the hungry heart no sweet resource r 

No green oasis in Love's lonely desert ? 

Enter "Venus, crowned with myrtle and roses. 

Beautiful queen, my sonl falls at thy feet, 
And all the portals of my heart are open ; 
Enter, blest giver of most blissful joys ! 
Allay the fever of its wild desires, 
And throne in it the idol of my dream. 

VENUS 

For maids who sweep no Paphian lyre 
I give all that their hearts desire ; 
But unto those endowed with song 
I grant no rites, nor do them wrong ; 
Their lives with music they should fill 
As was ordained by heavenly will. 

SAPPHO 

Oh ! pity, pity me ! strike not Hope dead 

Ere she bring forth quick Joy ! Break not my heart 

Upon the gift of song ; but grant to me 

One crumb, one pure, sweet crumb from thy rich 

table ! 
Drive not the suppliant minstrel from thy door 



30 SAPPHO. [act i. 

To starve upon ambrosia of the lyre, 
Which is food for the soul, not for the heart ! 
Bethink thee of thy great love for Adonis ; 
How many times it magnified the sun, 
And all the beauties of thy beauteous realm. 

VENUS 

Sappho, thy case thou pleadest well ; 
But truth to thee I've come to tell, 
And snatch thee from thy ruthless fate ; 
For thy dream's idol 'tis too late. 

SAPPHO 

Oh ! pity, pity me ; make me not mad ! 

VENUS 

Whilome I heard thy Paphian prayer, 
And hastened from the realms of air 
Erotic counsels to impart, 
And ease the aching of thy heart. 

Thy virgin feet were straying then 
In paths beset by gods and men, 
Beady to make thee any vow — 
Those virgin charms are absent now. 

The heyday of thy youth is flown, 
Thy cheeks no more with roses sown ; 
With thy plain face and stature short, 
The God of Love will now but sport. 

Thou hast been wed — and been unwed ; 
His nuptial couch thy rich spouse fled 
All discontent, and at my shrine 
Sought fresher, sweeter charms than thine. 



SCENE II. J SAPPHO. 31 

SAPPHO 

What say'st thou, cruel queen ? Am I proscribed 
Because my cheeks are blanched with early woe, 
And man's inconstancy and damned falsehood ? 

VENUS 

I only speak the things that be. 

Man deems himself created free 

To roam at will through beauty's bowers, 

And pluck the freshest, sweetest flowers. 

Love is not Jove's best gift to thee. 

Instead of beauty's potency 

He gave the boon of poesy ; 

Then court the Muse, and on thy lyre 

Expend thy heart's Erotic fire. 

SAPPHO 

Hath Jove implanted in this breast an ^Etna, 
And given no egress to its hell of fires ? 

VENUS 

Jove to his creatures doth no wrong. 
Thy bosom's fires pour into song ; 
Dare not heaven's greatest gift abuse 
By lightly dealing with the Muse. 

SAPPHO 

For poesy I flung the gauntlet down, 
My nature turned in unaccustomed channels, 
Pressed back the currents of maternal milk, 
Lavished my full-love-laden youth on song, 
And won the bays that wait upon the lyre ; 
But unappeasable my soul cries out 



32 SAPPHO. [act i. 

Across the starless desert of my life — 

' Love ! Love ! Love ! Love ! Lift to my lips thy cup 

Of dead inebriation ! ' 



VENUS 

Silence thy soul ! Lock up thy heart, 
Bar it against Erotic dart ; 
The die cast for Olympian wreath, 
To fling for love will win but death. 

SAPPHO 

Bid wild impetuous rivers backward turn, 

The rain refuse to fall, the grass to grow, 

The flowers to bloom, the womb of Nature quicken 

Beneath the vivifying touch of Sol, 

And they as well can do it as the poet 

Sever the ties that bind his soul to Eros : 

Love is the nerve and sinew of the Muse, 

The fire that drives her mettle to its height, 

And plumes her pinions for Olympian flight. 

VENUS 

Thou'rt mad, as poets always are. 

Go on ; and when night shrouds thy star, 

In vain thou'lt call on me in realms afar. [Exit. 

SAPPHO 

The inhemmed scorpion turns upon itself 

Its sting and dies : so may I — hence impious thought ! 

Steadfast I'll look injustice in the face, 

And hug the aspic in Promethian silence. 

Eros and Cupid, Venus, now adieu ! 

Apollo and the Muse henceforth I'll woo. 

[Crosses, and kneels at the altar of Apollo. 



SCENE II.] SAPPHO. 33 

Mighty Apollo, god of the silver bow, 

And guardian of the Muse above, below, 

From Jove's cloud-circled summit now descend, 

And to a child of song assistance lend, 

Who hath been wrecked on life's tempestuous sea, 

And lost all hold on heaven and earth save thee. 

Here in this desert haven be my firm anchor ; 

Bind up my heart- wounds and appease the canker- 

Worm folded in this bosom. 

With all that's high and great my soul inspire : 

Teach me to sculpture thought ; attune the lyre 

To highest tension of Homeric fire ; 

To weave a song whose harmony sublime 

Shall splendour worlds yet in the womb of Time. 

Make me thy darling ; smile upon my prayer ; 

Clothe me with wings to cleave Olympian air, 

And clasp the laurel-crown awaiting there. 



Enter Apollo with his lyre, and his brow twined with 
the sacred laurel. 

APOLLO 

Sappho of Lesbos, I have heard thy prayer, 
And come to speak to thee the words of wisdom : 
To few the gods award the laurel-crown. 
The greatest kings and queens, profoundest sages 
The world has known, have never worn the laurel. 
Not all the titles potentates confer ; 
Not all the gold that gilds the fields of Ophir ; 
Not all the treasures of the earth could buy it. 
It is reserved for the elect of Jove, 
The highest gift on mortals he bestows 
For highest virtues, linked with highest works. 
Who win th' immortal wreath must banish pleasure ; 
D 



34 SAPPHO. [act I. 

Turn from the pathways of seductive ease : 

Gird up their loins to battle with the Gorgons ; 

Ascend Parnassus over fiery thorns, 

Mid galling showers of Envy's barbed darts, 

And break their souls upon the Olympian lyre. 

If to these trials the Lesbian equal prove — 

Worship Diana and eschew Astarte — 

The deathless wreath shall be her great reward. 



SAPPHO 

Thrice beautiful Olympian god, inspire me ! 
Teach me the magic of thy mystic lyre ! 



APOLLO 

The magic of the lyre's unteachable 

As music of the spheres : 

It is the inborn fire of souls elect, 

And laureates of Olympus ; and struck out 

By the hard hand of Fate as spark from flint. 



SAPPHO 

I have known sorrow-gnawing, wasting woe 
That found no tongue in song. 

APOLLO 

Bless Jove for that : 
Sorrow's the ordained handmaid of the lyre — 
The Yulcan that strikes out ts latent fire. 

[Lightning , 
That is the poetry of heaven — some mighty soul, 
Smote by the jarring elements hath flashed 
Across the vision of the startled world. [Exit, 



scene ii.] SAPPHO. 35 

SAPPHO 

Stay, stay ! baptize me with eternal fire. 

[She falls forward as he goes out. Aloeus, 
Erinna, Clitus, and Rhodope rush m, lift her 
from the ground, and lead her on board the 
Athenian galley. A crowd of slaves with boxes 
and packages enter to the Lesbian galley. Young 
Lesbians run in, and cheer them as they push off. 



THE CURTAIN. 



D 2 



36 SAPPHO. [act ii. 



ACT II. 



SCENE I. 

Athens. Morning. A reception-hall in the palace of Pisistka- 
ttjs. A bust of Homer on a table, centre, at which the Tyrant, 
in state robes, and with the open Iliad in his hand, is seated, 
listening to Phaon's pipe. 

PISISTEATUS 
Thy piping, Phaon, might enchant the ear 
Of Pan, and win Arcadia's fairest nymph ; 
But rest thy lungs while I discourse with Homer. 

[Turns the leaves of the Iliad. 
Oh ! what a mighty mind had grand old Homer : 
He struck the key-note of the human heart, 
And raised men to the level of the gods. 
I'd rather be a poet than a king : 
The poet lives when kings are dead and rotten, 
And in their graves a thousand years forgotten : 
A king may wear a crown by stratagem, 
Usurp a throne, and guide the ship of state, 
And live his little day of gold and glitter ; 
The poet receives his crown from realms above ; 
His sole prerogative to reign from Jove. 
The poet's the historian of his time — 
Monarchs and heroes live but in his rhyme 
This portrait of Thersites breathes : list, Phaon. 



BCKNB I.] SAPPHO. 37 

' The ugliest man that came to Troy was he, 

One eye a- squint — one foot distort had he ; 

A narrow head — a scanty growth of hair, 

And mountain shoulders half his breast o'erspreading.' 

To be the author of such poetry 

Were worth a century of petty kingship. 

[Glances at Phaon. 
By Jove ! the fellow is asleep, and I've 
Been reading to the columns. Phaon ! Phaon ! 

phaon (as if aivaking) 
I'm here, my liege. 

P1SISTEATTJS 

Art dreaming of the Lesbian ? 

PHAON 

What youth in Athens doth not dream of Sappho ? 

PISISTRATUS 

Of Sappho all may dream, yet not go mad. 

PHAON 

I am not mad, but may be when 1 see her. 

PISISTRATUS 

The Lesbian's like all other women-poets ; 

Nor young, nor pretty — haughty, and conceited. 

PHAON 

If she were old as Endor, stooped as Atlas, 
Fancy would vest her with the charms of Venus. 

PISISTRATUS 

That verifies the adage — ■ Love is blind.' 



38 SAPPHO, [act ii. 

PHAON 

It verifies the wondrous spell of song 

When flowing from the lips of woman's soul. 

PISISTRATUS 

Now, by the gods ! what ague-fit is on thee ? 

PHAON 

The hour draws nigh, my liege, when she will enter 
To meet the bards and royal Agrigentum. 

PISISTRATUS. 

Well, what of that ? 

PHAON 

Of love they'll all go mad. 

PISISTRATUS 

Physic's a sovereign cure for love- sickness : 
Goslings and boys begetting down are verdant. 

PHAON 

Twang not the bow of satire at my heart. \_Aside. 
A thousand darts already quiver in it. 

CHAMB. {entering) 
My liege, Phalaris. \_A flourish. 

Enter Phalaris and train. 



pisistRatus (risii 

Welcome, Agrigentum. 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 39 

PHALARIS 

It glads me much to see the king of Athens, 
And hear of his poetical surroundings : 
Who are disputants for the envied laurel ? 

PISISTRATUS 

The loftiest names of song. 

PHALARIS 

I'd hear their music. 

PISISTRATUS 

Solon, Alcaeus, Ibycus, Theognis, 
Stesichorus, Anacreon, Erinna, 
Minermus, Thespis, iEsop, Sappho. 

PHALARIS 

Sappho 
Of Lesbos here ? 

PISISTRATUS 

They all are here, my lord. 

THALARIS 

I'd swim old Styx to see the Sapphic Muse. 

PISISTRATUS 

Upon this side that river thou shalt see her ; 
The Lesbian and the bards will here anon. 

PHALARIS 

How looks the Lesbian ? Is she beautiful, 
And young enough for Agrigentum's queen ? 



40 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

PISISTRATUS 

Not beautiful, but young enough, methinks. 

phaon (aside) 
My heart will burst — ray brain asunder split. 

Enter Poets. 

PISISTRATUS 

To Agrigentum let me name the poets — 
Solon, Anacreon, his kinsman, ^Esop, Thespis, 
Stesichorus, Theognis, Ibycus, 
And Minermus. 

PHALARIS 

I greet the bards of Greece. 
Enter Sappho, Alcjeus, and Erinna. 

PISISTRATUS 

Sappho, Alceeus, and the fair Erinna. 

phalaris (approaching Sappho) 
It glads me to behold che Queen of Song, 
To whom all honour, glory, doth belong. 

phaon (aside) 
I'd stab the lecherous savage to the heart ! 

SOLON 

I would not die until I know by heart 

The wondrous songs the Lesbian Muse hath sung. 



BCBNB I.] SAPPHO. 41 

STESTCHOEUS 

I'd ask no prouder wreath than Sappho wears. 

^:sop 
The Lesbian is the eagle of the skies, 
All other birdlings watch with longing eyes. 

phaon (aside) 
I'd like to knock his hump from off his shonlders. 

THEOGNrS 

Upon the brow of her who conquers all 
May glory's laurel-wreath to-morrow fall. 

THESPIS 

If Sappho tragedy had written she 
Had given to Thespis immortality. 

IBTCUS 

With earth and heaven to her I humbly bow. 

MINBEMUS 
Of mighty Jove I ask no higher fame 
Than or the list with hers to place my name. 

ANACREON 

Welcome to the Sapphic Muse 
Never let us bards refuse ; 
Honour to the Lesbian's lyre 
Let us pay, and drink its fire, 
And around her brow divine 
Myrtle with the laurel twine. 



42 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

In the mighty race of fame 
For the laurel and acclaim, 
Sappho and Anacreon 
Side by side to-morrow run ; 
If the lanrel- crown be mine 
Myrtle ronnd her brow I'll twine. 

phaon {aside) 

all ye serpents of perdition sting him ! 

ANACREON 

When I hear the Sapphic lyre 
All my youthful blood is fire, 
And like lightning through my heart 
Flashes Cupid's barbed dart ; 
If the laurel-crown be mine 
Myrtle round her brow I'll twine. 

Many a time my lyre I've strung, 
Many a song to Sappho sung, 
Many an anthem poured to Jove, 
Many unto the god of love ; 
If the laurel- crown be mine 
Myrtle round her brow I'll twine. 

Welcome, Sappho, welcome here ; 
Every poet holds thee dear ; 
Every king reveres thy beauty ; 
Every slave will do thee duty ; 
And around thy brow divine 
Myrtle with the laurel twine. 

SAPPHO 

1 thank these gallant monarchs and the poets 
For sweet bestowment of too much laudation. 

[Places her hand on the bust of Homer. 



scene i.] SAPPHO. 43 

This is the poet worthy of all praise, 

The poet worthy of the poet's worship ; 

From out whose brain leaped gods, as from the brow 

Of Jove Minerva sprang ; out of whose soul 

Gushed seas of harmony : 

The poet who four hundred years agone 

To music set the woes of Ilium. 

And with the cries of Agamemnon's foes 

Startled the ears of centuries unborn. 

When, aided by Apollo and the Muse, 

I climb Olympus high as Homer clomb, 

And take my seat beside th' immortal bard, 

Then, then, and not till then, poets, spend 

Your breath in wafting Sappho to the stars ! 

[Glancing right, she sees Phaon bending forward 
on his knee, and stretching out his hands to- 
wards her. 
'Tis he, 'tis he! 'Twas not a dream, Erinna ! 

[She swoons in Erinna' s arms. Phaon falls 
forward. All rush to her aid. 



SCENE II. 

Sappho's palace at Athens. A vine-latticed piazza, opening on 
a garden. A door, left, hading into a room with a window 
o piazza. Enter Sappho and Erinna by door, left. 
Pisistratus, Phalaris, Phaon, Aloeus, and other poets 
enter by garden, and are seen eaves -dropping among the vines, 
each unperceived by the other. 

ERINNA 

What envious shadow came across thy spirit, 
Like cloud athwart the sun at highest noon ? 



44 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

SAPPHO 
It was the apparition of my dream 
Whose beauty, flashing through my soul's wide 

windows, 
Did set my heart on fire. 

EEINNA 

Oh ! weave its flames 
Int' song, red-pinioned as Olympian bolt. 

SAPPHO 

White-lipped and mute the Muse now stands 

before 
The conflagration that is raging in me ; 
But at the Bionysia list to-morrow : 
As lightnings leap from out heaven's aching breast 
Into the seething air, 

My bosom's gathered fires shall flash in song. 
But lip nor lyre can tell thee what love is, 
Or is in me. ' 

It is a bird that sings in every bough, 
Enchanting worlds with mystic minstrelsy ; 
A hand that sweeps the strings of every heart, 
Striking out harmony or horrid discord ; 
A snake that charms to crush ; an &sp that kills 
With painless sting ; a cankerworm that folds 
Itself up in the sweetest, fairest buds ; 
A flame that blows itself out at one puff ; 
A fire that burns the fiercer when inhemmed, 
And with heat-whited tooth bites down to Hades. 
'Tis peace — 'tis war — 'tis life — annihilation — 
'Tis heaven— 'tis hell ! 

Thou saw'st how it did take away my breath — 
And thou wilt see it waft me unto death. 



_____ 



SCENE II.] SAPPHO. 45 

ERINNA 

The gods forbid the mastery of Cupid. 
But tell me how thou findst Pisistratus. 

SAPPHO 

Pisistratus was made to conquer kingdoms, 
Not hearts. 

ERINNA 

And how the young Anacreon ? 

SAPPHO 

He has a wine-nose, sloven, riotous mien : 
Anacreon should sing behind a screen, 
And ne'er before it be by sweetheart seen. 

ERINNA 

And iEsop, how ? 

SAPPHO 

His hump is merry-making. 

ERINNA 

How seems Phalaris and the other poets ? 

SAPPHO 

Insipid all as pap beside that youth, 

Who is the wedded souls of love and truth ; 

But call my soothsayer — I'd speak with him 

[Exit Erinna. 

pisistratus (aside) 
I've conquered kingdoms, and will conquer thee. 

PHALARIS (aside) 
Phalaris pap ! I'd roast her in my bull. 



46 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

anacreon (aside) 
I'll owe her one, and sing before the screen. 

msov (aside) 
Coiled up within my hump there is a serpent 
Whose venomed sting shall prick her to the heart. 

Sappho (to SOOTH, entering) 
What tidings from the oracles dost bring me ? 

SOOTH. 

That thou hast found the phantom of thy dream. 

SAPPHO 

Is he a man on whom the heart may lean ? 

SOOTH. 

He is. 

SAPPHO 

When it is drunk, and o'erlays reason ? 

SOOTH. 

Ay, even then. (Aside.) Jove ! protect the Muse 
Against the jealousies of Venus ! 

SAPPHO 

Go. [Exit Sooth. 

phaon (advancing and kneeling) 
Lesbian muse ! Paphian queen of song ! 
Angel on eagle's pinions borne along ! 
Thou star above the stars ! thou sun abov 



. 



SCENE IT.] SAPPHO. 47 

The sun ! 

Olympian fountain of Erdtic fire ! 

Thou wonder, and thou glory of the lyre ! 

Look not disdainfully upon a youth 

Who at thy feet hath come to lay the truth ! 

Untimely though it seem, and overbold 

In one so young — Oh ! let the tale be told ! 

I'm drunk on love — the music of thy name — 

Or mad — or both — which are, Muse, the same ! — ■ 

Knit not thy brow ! turn not thine eyes away ! 

But from my lips hear what my heart would say. 

My name is Phaon, and my years are few. 

Tending the flocks, a shepherd boy I grew 

Beside a sister and a fair betrothed 

Whom, since I heard the Sapphic lyre, I've loathed : 

Flown from as Indian flees the Upas-breath 

Whose honey-freighted dews to him are death. 

Few days agone I had a dream of thee — 

A dream so real, it seemed no dream to me. 

Thou wert sitting by the sea in thine own isle, 

Thy soft, brown cheek illumined with thy smile ; 

Thy tresses flowing backward from thy brow 

In sable showers upon a robe of snow, — 

Thy face uplifted towards th' enamoured skies, 

And all heaven beaming in thy soft dark eyes — 

The heaven of love — the heaven of poesy, 

And worshipping, I bent a lover's knee. 



SAPPHO 

stay ! stay ! unfold no more to me ; 
'Tis the fine woven woof of Destiny. 
As Jove declares his laws in bolts that gleam, 
The will of Fate's made manifest in dream. 

[Exit into the room. Phaon goes to the window, 
and looks in 



48 SAPPHO. ["act ir. 

PHAON 

O eyes ! that all tlie stars of heaven eclipse ; 
Bosom, whose whiteness shames Olympian snow ; 
Tresses, whose lustre pales the raven's wing ; 
Beauty, surpassing Aphrodite's — Hist ! 
One comes. 

[He crouches beneath the window. Pisistratus 

approaches, and seeing him, retires. Phalaris 

approaches. 

PHALARIS 

Phaon ! I'd like to roast him in my Bull. [Retires. 

an acre on {reeling to the window). 

Glorious Sappho ! queen of song, 
All my thoughts to thee belong ; 
Thou hast touched my heart with fire ; 
Pilled my breast with pure desire. 

[He attempts to scale the window. Aloeus, dart- 
ing from his hiding-place, seizes him. They 
go ont fighting. 







SCENE III.] SAPPHO. 49 



SCENE III. 

Olympia. Morning. An open space in front of the Temple of 
Zeus. An estrade, centre. An altar to Bacchus, left, sur- 
mounted by a statue in the attitude of drinking. Umpires 
enter to a bench on estrade. Pisistrattts, Phaxabis, and 
Princes to seats right of Umpires. Phaox, in blue and white, 
to place near Pisistratus. Sappho and Erinna enter to seats 
right. The Poets to seats left of estrade. Chorus of Satyrs 
enter right, led by Stesichorus. 



CHOEUS 

Bacchus is the god of plenty, 

God of wit, and wine, and pleasure ; 

Unto him our souls we'll empty, 
Fill the goblet without measure. 



Enter Bacchanalians right, leading a goat decked with 
gay ribbons and violets, followed by Pan and a 
crovjd of piping Shepherds. 

Pull the goat along, nor falter ; 

Lead him to the thirsty shrine ; 
Sacrifice him at the altar, 

So appease the god of wine, 

Then let all be joy and motion, 

Pipe, and siDg, and shout, and laugh ; 
Dance and frolic ; drink an ocean ; 
All the founts of pleasure quaff. 
[The Phallic procession, led by Thespis, passes 
from right to left, and takes up rear of stage. 
A dance of Fauns, Muses, and Satyrs folloivs. 

E 



50 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

AN umpire (rising) 
Now will we hear the poets speak their pieces. 
Anacreon commence. 



ANACREON 

President of Bacchic tribe, 
Mine to fill and joy prescribe. 
Drain the goblet, dance, and play — 
Mad discretion crowns the day : 
Blow your pipes and swell your lyres, 
Rapture calls, and wine inspires. 

UMPIRE 

Stesichorus, the Dorian, next. 

STESICHORUS 

Vain it is for us to weep 

That we all in death must sleep ; 

With man's life ends all the story 

Of his wisdom, wit, and glory. 

Then enjoy it while we may, 

Eat, and drink, and dance, and play ; 

Drain the founts of joy and pleasure, 

Fill the goblet without measure. 

UMPIRE 

Theognis of Magara. 

THEOGNIS 

Ah, me ! Alike o'er youth and age I sigh — 
Impending youth and age that hasten by — 
Swift as a thought the flowing moments roll ; 
Swift as a, racer speeds to reach the goal: 



SCENE III.] SAPPHO. 51 

How rich, how Happy the contented guest 
Who leaves the banquet soon and sinks to rest. 

UMPIRE 

Ibycus of Italy. 

IBTCUS 

In my bosom Cupid's power 

Never slumbered yet an hour. [ Applause. 

UMPIRE 

Alcseus of Mitylene. 

alcleus {glancing at sapphg) 
To Bacchus fill the goblet high ; 
To love I drink, and beauty's eye : 
For what is there but love below 
To lift the heart above its woe ? 
It shuts out wrong, and war, and strife, 
And is the pole-star of man's life. 
To Bacchus fill the goblet high ; 
To love I drink, and beauty's eye. 

When tost upon the stormy sea, 
A wanderer from his home is he ; 
The thunder rolls, the tempest raves, 
And death stares at him from the waves ; 
The star of love gleams through the dark, 
And angels guide his death-girt bark ; — 
To Bacchus fill the goblet high ; 
To love I drink, and beauty's eye. 

If from my heaven love's star depart 
'Twill leave no ray to light my heart : 
No sun, no moon, will shine for me 
On this side of eternity ; 

K 2 



52 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

And like the blind I'll grope my way 
Until I reach Olympian day. 
To Bacchus fill the goblet high ; 
To love I drink, and beauty's eye. 

UMPIEE 

Minermus of Ionia. 



MINEEMUS 

What were life, and what its treasures, 
Golden Venus, wert thou flown ? 

Ne'er may I outlive the pleasures 
Given to man by thee alone ; 

Honied gifts, and sacred love, 

Joys all other joys above ! 

UMPIEE 

JEsop, the fabulist. 

^:sop 
Yon glorious orb that gilds the day, 
Or placid moon with silver ray ; 
Earth, sea, whate'er we gaze upon 
Is thine, Nature ! thine alone ; 
But gifts which to ourselves we owe, 
What are they all but fear and woe ? 
Chance, pleasure — hardly worth possessing- 
Ten curses for a single blessing. 

UMPIEE 

Solon, the lawgiver. 

SOLON 

Short are the triumphs to injustice given. 
Jov6 sees the end of all from highest heaven ; 



SCENE III.] SAPPHO. 53 

And though his silent anger long may lie 
Wrapt in the vast concealment of the sky, 
Like livid lightning, never doth it sleep, 
And though the sire escape, the son shall weep. 

UMPIRE 

The fair Erinna. 

ERINNA 

Is there a king in all the earth 
Who would not give his right of birth, 
His royal crown, and regal sway, 
To wear the poet's deathless bay ? 
The king entombed in memory lies — 
The laurelled poet never dies. 

[The Icings applaud. 

UMPIRE 

Sappho of Lesbos, Greece with breathless ear 
Awaits the music of thy voice to hear. 

SAPPHO {glancing at PHAON) 
In Athens lives a noble youth 
Whose eyes speak tomes of love and truth, 
Whose presence, like the god of light, 
Makes all things beautiful and bright. 

When first I met his rapturous glance 
I felt a thrill my heart entrance, 
A fire spring up in every vein, 
An ^Etna burning in my brain. 

'Twas this deprived my soul of rest, 
And raised such tumults in my breast, 
That while I gazed, in transport tost, 
My breath was gone, my voice was lost ; 



54 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

My bosom glowed — the subtle flame 
Like lightning ran throngh all my frame ; 
O'er my dim eyes a darkness hung ; 
My ears with hollow murmurs rung. 

In dewy damps my limbs were chilled, 
My blood with gentle horrors thrilled, 
My feeble pulse forgot to play — 
I fainted, sunk, and died away. 

[Applause, and cries for another poem. 

SAPPHO 

Venus, come ! forsake the sky 
For this our banquet's gaiety ; 
Come while the golden beakers gleam, 
The nectar mix in purple stream : 
Fill to these gentle friends of mine 
The goblet with Erotic wine. 

Come, O goddess ! with thy smile 
All our earthly cares beguile ; 
Waken thy fires in every heart 
Not yet pierced by Cupid's dart ; 
Fill to these gentle friends of mine 
The goblet with Erotic wine. 

Twine the myrtle with the bay 

Hound my brow this happy day ; 

Kindle in one breast a fire 

Equal to my heart's desire : 

Fill to these gentle friends of mine 

The goblet with Erotic wine. 

[Phaon wrestles with a Spartan. While he stands 
with his foot on the oreast of his prostrate foe, 
Sappho fa Us on her knees and proffers him. her 
nosegay. As he takes it he kisses her hand. 



SCENE IV.] SAPPHO. 55 



SCENE IV. 

Sappho's palace at Athens. The piazza as in Act II. Scene II. 
Enter Sappho and Erixna by door, left. Pisistratus, 
Phalaris, Phaon, and the Poets appear among the vines. 



SAPPHO 
Oh ! I am suffering speechless agony ; 
Pangs overreaching iEsculapian art. 
Lay thy hand on my brow. 

ERINNA 

'Tis hot as ^Etna's. 

SAPPHO 

The kiss he lavished on my hand did burn 
Into my blood like molten lava. 

ERINNA 

Sappho, 
Thou art too great for Cupid's mastery. 

SAPPHO 

Cupid is master of us all — great, small — 

And art, though godlike's but his crouching slave. 

ERINNA 

Thou'lt not debase the mission of the Muse ? 

. SAPPHO 

My love is higher than the Muse's flight, 
And deeper than the fathom-line of reason. 



56 SAPPHO. [act ii 

ERINNA 

Alceeus loves tliee with a love all-seeing : 
Pisistratus, Phalaris, poets, umpires 
Are dying for thee. 

SAPPHO 

Seas of such love would leave my heart athirst. 
Kings have no hearts, and therefore cannot love. 
Poets have hearts, but worst of lovers prove. 
Kings mate themselves upon Ambition's terms, 
Poets on Vanity's or Passion's whims, 
I seek a' heart whose instincts are too high 
To bend to either. Love that brooks no curb, 
But burns its way untramelled as the comet. 

[Pisistratus approaches, and kneels. 

PISISTRATUS 

Behold the royal captive at thy feet ! 

Who offers thee his kingdom and his crown. 

SAPPHO 

I seek a crown that kings cannot confer. 

PISISTRATUS 

Dost dare, proud Muse, refuse the crown of Athens ! 

SAPPHO 

Bestow it on Caesura, 'tis her right. 

PISISTRATUS 

Right ! Women have no rights save courtesy's. 

[Aside. 
I'll crown that haughty brow, or break her heart. 

[Exit 



SCENE IT. J SAPPHO. 57 

phalaeis {advancing and crowning her) 
Plialaris crowns thee queen of Agrigentum. 

sappho (returning his croivii) 
Sappho aspires to wear no kingly crown. 

phalaeis (aside) 

She plays with kings and kingdoms as with baubles, 

Oh ! how I'd like to roast her in my bull I [Exit, 

[The Poets approach, and essay to hieel. She 

waves them to depart. Akacreon kneels. 



AXACREON 

By the spells of beauty bound, 

Helpless at thy feet I lie ; 
Venus ! bid my suit be crowned, 

And with rapture let me die. 

SAPPHO 

Bacchanal, rise, depart, and come no more ! 

[Exit Anacreon. 

aloeus (aside) 
She doth refuse them all : her heart is mine, 
And at her feet I'll lay it with my life. 

[As he approaches, Phaon advances and kneels. 

PHAON 

matchless Muse ! O love ! O fatal charmer ! 
Refuse me not the nuptial boon I ask, 
And all demented fling me to the fiends ! 



58 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

SAPPHO 

It were more meet to mate thyself with one 
Whose path is still entwined with vernal flowers. 

PHAON 

Spring- flowers are fresher, but less honey-lipped 
Than blossoms glorifying early summer. 

SAPPHO 

Bereavement and misfortune have been mine — 
The painful pangs ingratitude inflicts 
Upon the young and unsuspecting heart. 

PHAON 

If all the woes of Niobe were thine, 

The serpents of Medusa twined thy brow — 

I'd swim the fatal Styx to call thee mine. 

SAPPHO 

Phaon, in youth's sweet time I had a dream. 
I lay upon a bed of vernal flowers : 
The birds were singing round me like the angels, 
The Zephyrs fanning me with loving wings, 
And o'er me bent a youth with starry eyes, 
And beauty more transcendent than Apollo's. 
I woke : the youth had flown, but in my heart 
His image left ; I wore it — gazed on it 
Till it eclipsed all stars, all moons, all suns, 
And of my life became its solar system. 
Phaon, that youth was thou — that image thine. 
If I could pour my heart's pent fires in song, 
As heaven discharges her full-aching bosom 
Into the air, 'twould flame the universe ; 



SCENE IT.] SAPPHO. 59 

But th' only fire-pans of the sonl are words, 
Weak words, that hold not half its gathered light- 
nings. 
I love thee with a love all- comprehending 
As Jove's omniscience — all-searching, seeing — 
I love thee to the height and depth of being. 



PHAON 

Upon the pinnacle of bliss I stand. 
Oh ! could I fling away my lowly life 
As I can fling away a common garment ! 



SAPPHO 

Beauty's a gift divine. Who doth inspire 
A godlike love is kindred to the gods. 



PHAON 

I feel the greatness of a god within me. 
To be th' accepted of the Lesbian Muse, 
To stand beside her on the heights of Fame 
In presence of discarded kings and bards, 
Is glory that Olympian gods might envy. 



SAPPHO 

Phaon, before me here there is a line — 
A narrow boundary twixt bliss and woe. 
On this side I am all myself have made me ; 
On that I may be all that thou may'st make me ; 
On this side's love, fame, honour, adoration ; 
On that — dost wonder that I pause upon 
Tins side, and weigh the chances of the step ? 



60 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

phaon (clasping her to his bosom) 
Cross it, beloved ! fear not S Upon this side 
Eternal love and adoration wait thee, 

SAPPHO 

To-morrow to Olympia I repair. 
If on my brow the wreath of fame descend, 
Who there a myrtle crown me first present, 
To him shall be my heart and hand for ever. 

PHAON 

Then art thon mine, by all th' Olympian gods ! 
The myrtle, Hymen's holiest emblem there 
Shall seal, and sanctify my love, unfathomed, 
Unfathomable as eternity ! 
To-morrow, dost thon say, immortal Mnse ? 

SAPPHO 

I dare not look to-morrow in the face, 
So big to-morrow is with destiny. 

PHAON 

To-morrow holds eternity of bliss — 
To-morrow ? 

SAPPHO 

At Olympia to-morrow. 
[Exeunt Phaon by garden. Sappho by door 

aloeus (staggering forward) 
Where am I ? Whence this sable pall, 
Whose inky folds around me fall, 
Shutting the day- god from my sight ? 
Just now the world was full of light, 
And now to me 'tis starless night. 



SCENE IV.] SAPPHO. 61 

What have I done, ye gods ! Oh, say ! 
That ye should shut from me the day, 
And from my life its beacon bright ? 
Just now the world was full of light, 
And now to me 'tis starless night. 

Mine arms I put forth like the blind, 

And only empty darkness find — 

Sun, moon, and stars have taken their flight — 

Just now the world was full of light, 

And now to me 'tis starless night. 

Must I thus grope along the stream 
Of life without a beacon-beam 
To guide my lonely steps aright ? 
Just now the world was full of light, 
And now to me 'tis starless night. 

Pitying, Jove ! take me from earth ; 
Allay this bosom's gnawing dearth ; 
Translate to heaven my beacon bright : 
Just now the world was full of light, 
And now to me 'tis starless night. 

[Falls on his knees, and hides his face in his 
hands. Sappho re-enters, and lays her hands 
softly on his broiv. He springs up with a 
shudder. 
Basilisk, off! Thy touch, though soft as love's, 
Is venomous as the aspic's sting ! From thee 
The mantle of divinity hath fallen. 
And left thee standing in polution's garb, 
A thing to make the blood of virtue quake. 

SAPPHO 

Alcasus ! for the love of sacred things 

Let not thy tongue unsheathe heart-slaying daggers. 



62 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

ALC^US 

Heart ! Thine is food for carrion birds ; 
I saw an unfledged buzzard pecking on it ! 
There is no Sappho now ; 
Her funeral knell is ringing in my heart. 

SAPPHO 

Alcseus, my dead father's friend and mine, 

Forgive, and be forgiven. I have lost 

The helm of reason. Passion's turbulent sea 

Tosses my helpless life-bark towards Charybdis : 

Help me to steer it wide of Scylla's hounds, 

And moor it in the haven of thy love ! 

In Phaen's glance there is a sorcerer's spell, 

That holds and draws me like a serpent's charm ; 

An iEtna in his touch whose red-lipped lavas 

Sow in my blood delicious agonies 

Of death. 

ALCiEUS 
I'll kill him ! 

SAPPHO 

No, that would kill me, 
His life's my life — his death sure death to me. 

ALO^US 
O jealous, damned Yenus, that for spite 
Dost crucify the greatest of the Muses ! 
Come to the garden, love, and let sweet zephyr 
Fan thy Lot brow. Come, lean on me as erst ; 
The reed shall break beneath thee never more. 

[Exeunt by garden. 



SCEN'E v.] SAPPHO. 63 



SCENE V. 

Olympia. Interior of the Temple of Zeus. A statue of Zeus on 
the altar. An estrade, centre. A great crowd of people 
enter, and fill up the background. Royal trains enter, and 
take up their places. Pisistratus, Pealaris, Princes, and 
Umpires enter to seats on estrade. The poets to places, left. 
Sappho, attired in white skirt and pxirple mantle, trimmed 
with gold, and her arms and ankles twined with laurel, enters 
with Eren~na, right. 

umpire (rising) 

With meet respect and honour for these poets, 

Who bravely have contended for the prize, 

To Lesbian Sappho we award the laurel. 

Sappho, approach. [She kneels on first step of estrade. 

In presence of the gods, 
Poets and kings, and Greece assembled here, 
We crown thee Queen of Song. Arise, great Muse ! 

SAPPHO (rising) 
To these wise umpires and assembled Greece 
Be all my thanks. 

PEOPLE 

Speak on, thy voice is music 
Sweeter than ever rapt Olympian ears. 

SAPPHO 

I am a poet, not an orator. 

PEOPLE 

The poet's both. His words are fire ; his songs 
The beacons burning on the heights of time. 



64 SAPPHO. [act ii. 

SAPPHO 

Came Sappho hither on the wings of ease ? 
Cheered by the smiles of older, stronger climbers ? 
Were there who, pitying, gave a hand to help 
Her up the treacherous steeps ? Were there who 

paused 
To list her cries, and to her aid descend 
When footholds failed, and reeds beneath her broke ? 
Look down the thorny path up which she clomb 
All crimson with the blood of her scarred feet, 
And learn at what a price she wears the laurel. 

PEOPLE 

Thy future way with diamonds shall be paved. 

SAPPHO 

Few are the gems that strew the poet's path ; 

Few are the cups of bliss for him to quaff ; 

Children of the lyre, however great their worth, 

Or broad be their possessions on the earth, 

Are martyrs to their mission, heirs of wrong, 

Sad immolations on the shrine of song. 

Their natal orbits lie as far above 

The paths of common souls as realms of Jove ; 

They walk with men but are not of mankind ; 

They hold discourse with worlds to which they're 

blind, 
And with rapt visions gaze beyond the skies, 
While on the things of earth men keep their eyes. 
[Phaon dashes through the parting croicd, and 
thrusts a myrtle crown in Sappho's hand just as 
Aloeus and the other poets approach with 
theirs. Alc^us springs at him with vengeance 



SCENE V.] SAPPHO. 65 

in his eye; then starts hack, flings away his 
myrtle crown, and rushes out, crying. 
ISTo, no ! I will not be a murderer ! 

[Phaon leads her out amid the applause of the 
multitude. 



THE CURTAIN. 



66 SAPPHO. [act m. 



ACT III. 



SCENE I. 



Athens. A hall in Sappho's palace. Slaves docorating it with 
laurel. Clittts wreathing a little throne with myrtle and 
roses. Ehodope weaving a garland at a table near him. 



clitus (aside) 

Now all is ready for the Queen of Song, 

And her young husband, Phaon. Poor Alcseus ! 

Illusions football, Cupid's shuttlecock ! 

Kicked here, knocked there, and twice drove to the 

wall. 
Since her tenth year he has adored the Muse, 
And now she's six-and- thirty, he quite fifty. 
When Sappho wed the merchant prince of Andros 
The bard went mad as Agamemnon's son, 
And rested not until he bred a rupture 
In Hymen's realm. He'll kick at heaven again. 
I'll do my best to match him with Erinna : 
Though she have less than half his years, her love 
Will prove an anchor to his drifting life-bark, 
And keep his soul from leaping overboard ; 
Rhodope, what art doing there so long ? 



i 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 67 

KHODOPE 

Weaving a garland for my little Sappliie. 

CLITUS 

Go, get the dancers ready. Tell Cleone 

To look her prettiest : she's to play the Hebe, 

And lead the dancers in the Muses' revel. 

Look to her garb. Let there be nothing in it 

That can impede the poetry of motion : 

Let fleecy skirts just dally with her knees, 

And silken gaiters case her twinkling feet : S^X^v^cL^kM-J 

Down to her slender waist, as free as air, 

Let fall the clusters of her raven hair, 

And in the sable threads weave amber roses ; 

But not another ornament or gem ; 

Youth, unadorned, is beauty's diadem. 

[Exit Rhodope. 

A SLAVE 

Where wilt thou seat the kings and poets ? 

CLITUS 

Nowhere : 
We'll have no kings and poets here to-night, 
Except Alcaeus and Erinna who, 
In fee, are chattels of the Sapphic Muse. 
This festival is ours. It is our right 
To fete our mistress on her nuptial night. 
Hark ye ! swift chariot- wheels straight from Olympia. 

[Looks on/. 
Ho ! they come ! summon the dancers. Quirk ! 
they come! [Looks out again. 

How beautifully looks the Queen of Song ! 
With what majestic grace she wears the laurel. 
Snatched from the clutch of Greece's envious bards. 
But for that dough-faced shepherd at her side, 



68 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

She'd be Astarte and Diana twined 

By the immortal laurel. But down from 

The summit of Olympus she has stooped 

To lift an idiot to the poet's height. 

There, ashen-lipped as death, Alcseus comes, 

Leading Erinna. Poor old jilted bard, 

I pity him ! 

Enter a crowd of slaves with flowers and branches of 
laurel, preceded by Cleon6, whom he turns to regard. 

Oh ! she is lovely as wine-pouring Hebe ! 

Pray Jove she may not captivate the bridegroom, 

And set her tiny foot on Sappho's heart ! 

She's dark, he's light, and opposites attract. 

\LooTcs out again. 

Ho ! here they come ! down on your knees and make 

A floral carpet for the Muse's feet ! 

[Slaves kneel and lay their flowers on the ground. 
At first sight of Phaon, Cleone faints in the 
arms of a slave. Clitus and other slaves cheer 
and cry, ' Welcome Muse ! welcome adored mis- 
tress ! ' Sappho and Phaon 'pass to the throne, 
and Algmxjs leads Erinna to seats fomvard. 
Cleone fetches wine to Sappho and Phaon, 
Aloeus and Erinna. 



SAPPHO (rising) 

Kind friends, I thank you for this generous greeting 

And lavish overflowing of your hearts. 

These decorations, interwove with smiles 

Brighter than Sol's, bespeak your sweet contentment 

With this young master I've imposed upon you ; 

Love only can repay the debt of love. 

Count on my heart for twice what ye've invested. 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 69 

SLAVES 

We only seek the Muse's happiness ! 

SAPPHO 

After long weary years of toiling, climbing 
Up thorny steeps mid envy's barbed arrows, 
To-day I reached the summit of Olympus, 
And on my brow received the laurel-crown. 

SLAVES 

Thy brow is worthy of th' immortal laurel ! 

Sappho (holding up the myrtle-crown) 
Help me to twine with it this myrtle-wreath 
In deathless union. 

SLAVES 

Oh ! we will ! we will ! 
[They tuine the myrtle-wreath with her laurel crown 

SAPPHO 

Cleone, dearest, where's thy greeting kiss ? 

'Tis only needed to complete my bliss. 

[Cleone, glancing timidly at Phaon, comes for- 
ward and kisses her. 

Thou art as fresh as spring, as summer sweet, 

Now let us list the music of thy feet. 

\_As Cleone" floats through the dance, Phaon fol- 
lows her with loving eyes, and flings her roses 
from Sappho's bouquet, which the Muse plea- 
santly resents. Pisistratus, Phalaris, and the 
Poets enter disguised, and mingle among the 
dancers. All exeunt hut Aloe us and Erinna. 



70 SAPPHO. [act in. 

ALC^US 

Erinna, did'st thou mark that brainless shepherd 
Follow Cleone with enamoured eyes, 
And fling her roses mid the dizzy dance ? 
Already he is smit, and Sappho jealous. 
Ill-fated Muse ! deluded Queen of Song ! 
My fallen angel ! my lost star ! my death ! 

\_Qazes on a fixed point. 
Oh ! horrid, horrid, damned thing, that dost 
Appal my soul and prompt it to take flight 
From this ungenial and tempestuous sphere ! 
Oh ! oh ! oh ! it is hideous and brain-splitting, 
Erinna ! 

ERINNA 

What, Alca3us ? 



ALCiEUS 

Naked life ! 
This world divested of illusion's mantle 
Affrights me, and I will have done with it ! 



ERINNA {grasping Ms dagger) 
Alcseus ! madman ! stay thine impious hand : 
Self-murder is the action of a coward ; 
Calm durance of life's ills true bravery ; 
Gird up thy soul to battle with the Fates, 
Conquer by moral arms, not murderous steel. 
Come forth, and let the stars restore thy senses ; 
I do compassionate thy wondrous woe, 
And with my blood would bathe thy burning wounds, 
If blood could heal the rents of Cupid's darts. 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 71 

ALOE US 

Angelic girl ! would there were more like thee. 
Take me, my life is thine, since thou did'st save it. 

[Exeunt. 



SCENE II. 

The garden of Sappho's palace. A parterre of flowers and shrubs, 
centre. Enter Gleone, right, plucks some flowers, and sings 
in a low voice ; Phaon follows, and pauses a little behind her. 
Alcjeus enters and stands behind a myrtle, watching 
them. 



CLEONE (arranging a bouquet) 

In distant Lesbian vales 
My bosom knew no sigh ; 

There Sappho told me tales, 
And sang me lullaby ; 

But here no loving word, 
No smiles illume my breast, 

And like an unfledged bird 
Hurled from its happy nest, 

In the folds of some dear bosom 
Nestling, I'd hush my wees, 

As bee within the blossom 
Folds its wings in soft repose. 

PHAON (aside) 
And in this bosom thou shalt fold thy wings, 
Sweet, homeless dove. 



72 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

CLE one {looking up) 

Methought I heard a voice ! 
'Twas only some enamoured bird love-prating. 

[ Sings. 
Were I a bird his cooing 

I'd list with heart elate, 

Leave him not long a- wooing, 

But be at once his mate : 

With him soar on the ether 

Into the eye of day. 
Or, nestling 'mong the heather, 

Bill and coo with him for aye. 

phaon (aside) 
How beautiful is love when first awaking 
Within a young maid's breast ? How potent and 
How wonderful its spell upon man's heart ? 

CLEONE (singing) 

In Lesbos Sappho loved me, 
My bosom filled with blisses, 

A gentle mother proved me, 
Here Phaon only kisses. 

From morn to even she 

Enchains him with caresses, 

Or, smiling lovingly, 

Plays with his golden tresses. 

I gaze ; they see not me, 

Hear not my heart's wild throbbing, 
And swift as dart I flee, 

Lest they should hear me sobbing. 



SCENE II.] SAPPHO. 73 

Why should I weep and pine, 
The gods onr hearts dissever ! 

Alas ! he should be mine ! 
Our hearts be one for ever ! 



PHAON (darting forward?) 
And by the gods, they shall be one for ever ! 

CLEO^ 

I am her slave ! She'll kill me ! oh, she'll kill me ! 

PHAON 

Fear not, sweet trembling dove ; she shall not touch 
thee. 

CLEON^ 

Thou'rt Sappho's husband, 1 her little slave. 

phaon (opening his arms) 
Come to this bosom, and thou shalt be free. 

[She flies into his arms and hides her face in his 
bosom. A serpent lifts its head above the 
floiuers, regards them, and disappears. Sappho, 
radiant with smiles, enters, left, plucks some 
flowers, and kisses them. 

SAPPHO 

Ye are the smiles that angels leave behind them 
When they have ended their nocturnal vigils. 
Sweet benedictions to the loved bequeathed Jl - 

By unseen guardians rfrom her( earthly weal. 61 v}V<Lf) 
[ Walks about, caressing the flowers, and contem- 
plating the scene with ecstacy. 



74 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

How bright the god of day ! How fair the morn ! 

And jubilant the nuptial choirs of nature ; 

The very air is drunk on marriage-music. 

O love ! joy ! sweet connubial bliss ! 

O happiness ! for which Jove hath no name ! 

My heart hath found such thrift in your pure light ; 

My soul attained to such full, lofty stature ; 

My thoughts so deep, so high, so broad have grown, 

And drawn around them such unearthly beauty ; 

My head seems circled by celestial spheres, 

And in aerial paths my feet are treading. 

[The serpent lifts half Us length above the flowers, 
stretches forth its triumphant head, and hisses 
in her face. With a shrieh she starts hack, and 
falls. Cleone darts away, and Phaon flies to 
her, followed by Alc^us, unjoerceived. 

phaon (raising her from the ground) 
Sappho ! What evil hath befallen thee ? 

SAPPHO 

Is it gone ? is it gone ? 

PHAON 

What, dearest, what ? 



That serpent 



SAPPHO 
PHAON 

Serpent ! 



SAPPHO 

Ay, a serpent ! 

PHAON 



Where ? 



SCENE II.] SAPPHO. 75 

SAPPHO 

There from those flowers a serpent, long and black, 

And with Satanic triumph in its eyes, 

Stretched forth its sable length with tongue extant, 

And hissed into my face as but the devil, 

Or his most perfect tutored imp could hiss. 

I was so happy — lost in such sweet dream 

Of nuptial bliss ; it seemed that heaven was pouring 

Into my soul all her divine elixir. 

Phaon ! Phaon ! keep guard on thy heart ! 

Be true — be faithful to thy nuptial vow. 

This serpent is the devil who is come 

To thrust his hideous shape twixt thee and me 

phaon (with a forced laugh) 
Lesbian Sappho ! thou a poet art, 
And to this serpent dost apply thine art ; 
Investst him with the majesty of devil, 

SAPPHO (mournfully) 
Phaon, dost love me now as at Olympia ? 

PHAON 

Ay, more ; but why dost question thus thy Phaon ? 

SAPPHO 

All things have their ascent and their descent ; 
And, therefore, have their culminating points 
Whereon they poise, and tremble in their fulness. 
At morn the sun casts forth a temperate glance ; 
At noon he burns ; at even languishes. 
'Tis thus with love : its morn is temperate; 
Its noon is fire ; its evening ashes. 



SAPPHO. [act hi. 



PHAON 

Beautiful. 



SAPPHO 

A month agone thy love was in its zenith. 
Dost wonder if I fear it's crossed the lice ? 



PHAON 

When thon dost hear what gauntlets Phaon run 
To reach Olympia at the crowning moment, 
And proffer thee the first the myrtle-wreath, 
Thou'lt swear his love can never quit the zenith. 
Booted and spurred, and waiting for my courser, 
I found my portal double-barred against me. 
I cried for help — none dared to heed my cries. 
Lashed by the Furies to a Hercules, 
I. flung my soul against the yielding door, 
Flew to the royal stables, slew the groom, 
Led forth the prancing courser, mounted him, 
And sunk my spurs into his quivering flanks. 
The way half won, a visored cavalier, 
Wearing upon his arm a myrtle crown, 
And holding high in air a glittering spear, 
Upon a flying charger overtook me, 
And, lifeless, struck my steed from under me. 
I rose, unhorsed my foe, sprang in his saddle, 
And, with the speed of lightning, gained Olympia. 
It was the emissary of the Tyrant 

SAPPHO 

Pisistratus ! Forgive ! 'Twas not a doubt 
Of thee that crossed my Eden, but doubt's shadow- 
'Tis gone, and all love's heaven is bright again. 
Phaon, dear Phaon, if I sometimes seem 



SCENE II.] SAPPHO. 77 

Like one smote by the plague of jealousy — 
Unwitted, wide of wisdom, speak — smile on it, 
As Sol upon the crazy cloud that beards him. 
I love thee with such strength, such fine perception 
Of all the subtle meanings of love's language. 
Lay my soul's ear so close up to thy soul ; 
I hear the footsteps of thy thoughts ere born. 

PHAON (startled) 
Art thou magician, too, as well as poet ? 

SAPPHO 

As oracles unlock the book of Fate, 
And bare her sealed intents to mortal eyes ; 
So doth the poet oft unclasp man's heart, 
And drag its inmost secrets to the light. 

PHAON 

The poet's powers above Olympus soar— 
I swear to love the Lesbian evermore. 

[Exeunt, lovingly. 

ALCJ3US 

Perfidious liar ! Sweet, smooth-tongued serpent ! he 
Just swore to love her slave eternally. [Exit. 



78 SAPPHO. [act hi. 



SCENE III. 

A cabinet in the palace of Pisistbattjs. Enter Pisistratus 
and Confio. 



PISISTEATUS 

When wert thou last at Sappho's ? 

CONFIO 

Yestereve. 
I saw Cleone dance before the Lesbian. 

PISISTRATUS 

How on the black- eyed beauty looked our Phaon ? 

CONFIO 

Trembling and flushed, he watched her twinkling feet, 
Then proffered her a rose which Sappho clutched, 
And ground to powder 'twixt her dainty fingers. 

PISISTRATUS 

What spoke this action to thy mind ? 

CONFIO 

Rank jealousy. 

PISISTRATUS 

Think' st Phaon of Cleone is enamoured r 

CONFIO 

If Phaon of Cleone be not smitten, 
Pisistratus is not the king of Athens. 



SCBNE III.] SAPPHO. 79 

PISISTRATUS 

The Lesbian's honeymoon is not all honey — 
'Tis little past a month. 

COXFIO 

It is not that, 
My liege ; 'tis scarce three weeks of cloud and shine. 

PISISTEATUS 

Nor heaven nor earth can legislate for Cnpid. 
He will slip through the finest of their meshes, 
Pilfer his neighbours' flowers before their eyes, 
And laugh defiance in their tearful faces. 

COXFIO 

'Tis true, my liege. 

PISISTRATUS 

And what is true is right ; 
And what is right is true. If Phaon find 
The Lesbian's floweret sweeter than the Lesbian, 
Sure he should pluck it. 

CONFIO 

Thou dost reason well, liesre. 

PISISTRATUS 

'Tis strange, a woman of such fine perception, 
Such breadth and depth of mental penetration, 
Of such high soaring genius as the Lesbian, 
Should stake her happiness on such a man : 
Inconstancy upon his face is stamped 
As plainly as his nose. 



80 SAPPHO. [act in. 

CONFIO 

It is, my liege, 
And proves that love is blind, 

PISISTRATUS 

It does, by Jove ! 
And shows that poets are the worst of tailors : 
They measure human by ideal forms, 
And by the error make the illest fits — 
Is th' Appins at anchor in the bay ? 

CONFIO 

Thy galley's there, my liege. 

PISISTRATUS 

Is the wind fair ? 

CONFIO 

'Tis. 

PISISTRATUS 

Bid the sails be set for Sicily, 
And send the lovers on a pleasure trip. 
Dost understand me ? 

CONFIO 

Ay. 

PISISTRATUS 

Then act upon 
Thy knowledge. Thou dost know I love the Lesbian, 
And am resolved to make her queen of Athens. 

CONFIO 

So thou hast told me twice before, my liege. 



SCENE ITI.] SAPPHO. 81 

PISISTKATUS 

Hadst thon slain Phaon on the Olympian plain 
Instead the royal conrser he bestrode, 
And twined my myrtle with the Lesbian's laurel, 
The Queen of Song had been my queen that day. 

CONFIO 

It was a piece of damned luck, my liege, 

And proves how difficult 'tis to shoot game flying. 

PISISTEATUS 

I now will tell thee how to mend thy luck. 
The music of Cleone's little feet 
Is promised me this hour ; bid Phaon to me. 
She will not take ten steps ere he'll go mad, 
And, bounding forward, clasp her in his arms — 
See that the Lesbian gaze upon the picture ! 
Mind, no mistake this time ! 

CONFIO 

I'll mend my luck. [Exit. 

PISISTEATUS 

Why Jove hath in a female temple placed 

A mind like Sappho's is anomalous. 

In Homer only can we find her equal, 

And on her brow I'd rather set my crown 

Than on the head of Sheba's fairest queen. 

Thrice for Athenae's diadem I threw, 

And won. I've thrown for Sappho, and will win. 

Enter Phaon with roses. 

Roses again ? Thou'Jt pluck my gardens bare 
To deck thy mistress. Lov'st Cleone well ? 



82 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

PHAON 

More than my life, my liege. 

PISISTRATUS 

Thou wert a fool 
To throw thyself away upon the Lesbian, 
Who might thy mother be. 

PHAON 

There is a time 
In life when all must play the fool, my liege ; 
And I have done it in my twentieth year. 
Awakened reason tells me I can know 
No bliss but with Cleone. 

% 

PISISTRATUS 

Thou shalt have her. 
Get thee behind that screen : the charmer comes ! 
[He steps behind the screen. Cleone enters 
timidly, trips up to Pisistratus, and kneels. 
Welcome, my little black-eyed sylph, welcome — 
Tears oozing through the curtains of thine eyes ! 
What's sprung the fountain of Cleone' s heart ? 

CLEONE* 

Alas ! thou hast discoursed too much of Phaon ! 

PISISTRATUS 

Cleone is in love ? 

cleone" 
Alas ! Alas ! 



SCENE III.] SAPPHO. 83 

PISISTRATUS 

Wouldst like to go to Sicily with Phaon ? 

CLEONE* 

More than to go to Heaven it would rejoice me. 

PISISTRATUS 

Then dry thine eyes, my girl, and trust to me 

For Phaon and a trip to Sicily. 

Now let me list the music of thy feet, 

And see the smiles of Hebe on thy lips. 

[Cleone dances ivith a step light as ai/r. Phaon 
watches her with enamoured eyes, hounds from 
behind the screen, clasps her in his arms, and 
places his roses in her hair and bosom. Sappho 
enters, starts back, and rushes away. 



SCENE IV. 

The piazza, as in Act II. Scenes II. and IV. Sappho, pale and 
dishevelled, rushes in from the garden, and falls forward. 
Aloeus follows, and pauses near her. Eeinna enters by 
door, left, and joins him. 



Sappho (half-rising) 
1 fear I'm mad. So fiercely burns my brain ; 
So wildly leaps my pulse, I fear I'm mad. 
'Th adulterous embrace mine eyes beheld ; 
The laughing fiends that pulled me by the hair 
May be the phantoms of a brain disordered. 

J j>auxc. 

G 2 



84 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

Phaon Cleone folded to his bosom 

Fondly, as if she were the world to him 

And Sappho were forgotten. death ! death ! 

madness ! shut the horrid pictnre oat ! \_A pause. 

Phaon, whom I have lifted to the poet's level. 

No ! no ! it is not trne ! my reason's blurred. 

[J. pause. 
My little black-eyed slave, Cleone, 
Whom on the market-place one day I bought 
For pity, bore her in mine own arms home, 
Fed, nursed her in my bosom as my child ; 
That she could slay me with those charms that I 
Had snatched from base-souled trafficker in beauty — 
Ha, gods ! she is my slave. Her life is mine ! 

\_F eels for dagger. 
'Tis there ! T found it not when at her couch ; 
How sweetly flowed the balmy breath between 
The rosy lips just parted on the pearls. 
That dimpled bosom, veiled with raven tresses 
The picture slew my murderous intent ! 
Tell me, ye gods ! What is this thing called love ? 
This something holding in it heaven and hell ? 
This something reason cannot put aside ? 
But which devours like dread Eumenides ? 

eeinna {struggling with alcjius) 
Oh ! I must speak to her, and with my blood, 
If needs be, staunch her wounds. 

A.LCMUS 

Restrain thy love. 
The knowledga of our presence may prove fatal. 
She has a dagger, and may turn it on 
Herself. These two hoars through the woods I've 
followed 



SCENE IV.] SAPPHO. 85 

Close on her steps to save her from self-mnrder. 
Now flew she like the wind, a-crying ' Off! 
Wild, laughing fiends ! pull me not by the hair ! ' 
Then on her face wept till the stones dissolved. 

ERINNA 

Thou shalt not hold me longer from the Muse ! 

[Buns to Sappho. 
Sappho, sweet friend, my best beloved on earth, 
Arise ! 

SAPPHO 

What brought thee here ! Grief has no friends. 



ERINNA 

I came to take on me thy wondrous woe. 

SAPPHO 

Weak, silly girl ! wert thou as strong as Atlas 

'T would crush thee. Go ! go ! go ! thy presence 

prompts 
Dark thoughts. 

ERINNA 

Sappho ! what hath changed thee so ? 

SAPPHO 

Perfidy, wrong, the tortures of the damned ; 
Away ! I want no soft thing near me now, 
But something equal to my agony 
That could cope with a million of Hercules. 

ERINNA 

Apollo's darling, where's that mighty love 
That fired Olympian gods ? 



86 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

SAPPHO 

Crushed, buried under 
The ruins of my shattered idols. Go ! 
I must tear something as this heart is torn ; 
Break something as this heart is broken. Go ! go ! 
[Sinks doivn with her face concealed in her hands. 
Alozeus bears Erinna out, swooning. 

ehodope (knocking) 
O baby, baby ! let Rhodope enter ; 
Thy faithful Clitus would speak with thee, too. 

SAPPHO 

The sound of human voices startles me, 
And gives my soul the ague. 

RHODOPE {entering) 

sweet baby ! 



Apollo's pet 



CLITUS 
SAPPHO 

Cleone, where is she ? 



CLITUS 

The child is in her room. 

SAPPHO 

What doth she there ? 

CLITUS 

I cannot tell thee : strange her conduct is. 

Now sits she lost in thought, then sings, then weeps, 

Then sings again in low, sad love-tuned voice 



SCENE IV.] SAPPHO. 87 

Just like a dovelet pining for a mate ; 

This morn, with downy step, she sought the brook, 

I followed after, watched her there. 



SAPPHO 



CL1TUS 

"With whom ? 



With him ? 



SAPPHO 

Go on ! 

CLITUS 

Upon the bank she doffed 
Her pretty clothes, then glancing timidly 
This way and that, to see if ought beheld 
Her beauty, tripped into the stream, and stood 
Sprinkling with little hands her b adding bosom, 
The fairest of 

SAPPHO 

Not praise, but knowledge give me ! 

CLITUS 

The bath and labour of the toilet ended, 
She hastened homeward, glided to her room, 
The portal closed behind her, locked it, and 
Began to sing 

SAPPHO 

To sing ! go, bring her here ! 
Rhodope, go, and bid my soothsayer come ! 

[Exeunt Clitus and Rhodopk. 
How will the traitoress meet my searching eye ? 



88 SAPPHO. Tact hi. 

That from her heart shall tear its damned secret, 
Though all hell's triple bolts its portals bar ! 

[To Soothsayeb, entering. 
What balm canst pour into my wounds ? 

SOOTH. 

None, Muse. 

SAPPHO 

None ! none ! are heaven's doors closed against me, 
too ? 

SOOTH. 

'Tis sad. 

SAPPHO 

Sad! what? 



SOOTH. 

That Phaon loves Cleone. 

SAPPHO 

Loves her ! my slave, Cleone ? 



SOOTH. 



More than life. 



SAPPHO 

Fool ! get thee gone, ere I make powder of thee ! 

[Exit Sooth, and enter Cleone\ 
She's beautiful, she's beautiful as spring. — 
Oh ! give me back, ye gods, my primal youth ! 
From memory tear the register of grief, 
And only leave the record of that age 
When the young heart clothes the world in its own 
beauty ! 



SCENE IV.] SAPPHO. 89 

cleone" (timidly} 
Sappho, dear Sappho, didst thou send for me ? 

sappho {aside) 
How carefully attired to meet my Phaon ! 

CLEONE (approaching) 
Sappho, my mistress, I await thy bidding. 

SAPPHO 
Wherefore so timid and so coyish now ? 
Thou wert not so of late : why dost thou tremble ? 
Come nearer, child, and let us talk together. 
What festival demands this dress to-day ? 

cleone" 
Festival ! 

SAPPHO 

Why so carefully attired ? 

CLEONE* 

Myself to please the Lesbian I attired. 

sappho (aside) 
She's quick at lying, false as falsest hell ! 
Cleone, come to me, come to these loving arms ! 
Be not afraid, my child, I am thy friend, 
The truest, best that thou wilt ever find, 
Hold not aloof! I'd harm myself ere thee ; 
Open these veins to serve thee ; thrust this bosom, 
Naked, between thee and all venomed darts. [Sobs. 
Cleone, hast thou ever thought of marriage ? 
That holy love that binds two hearts in one 
By ties not made for mortal hands to break ? 
And hast thou ever pictured to thyself 



90 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

The pain of hearts thus bound, then torn asunder ? 

The wasting pangs, the burning agonies 

Of wounds that never heal, yet do not kill ? [Sobs. 

Cleone, dost remember thou the day, 

Now near eleven years, thou first saw'st Sappho ? 

Along the crowded slave- market she past, 

And 'mong a hundred other little orphans, 

Waiting for purchasers, beheld thee standing, 

And paid the price. Dost thou remember it ? 

When fever fixed its fetid fangs on thee, 

Whose was the breast that through the weary night, 

All self-forgetting, pillowed thy young head ? 

cleone (rushing into her arms) 
'Twas thine, dear Muse ! 

SAPPHO 

There, there, ah ! well I knew 
Thou wouldst not of thyself betray thy Sappho ! 

cleone (drawing lack) 
O Sappho ! what? 

SAPPHO 

Thou know'st too well, Cleone, 
Why dost thou struggle in my loving clasp ? 
Look in my face ! Why art thine eyes averted ? 
Not timid thus wert thou when Phaon kissed thee. 
Ah ! ha ! now thou art red ! Thy flaming cheeks, 
Thy tied-up tongue, averted downcast eyes 
Are of thy damned guilt the witnesses ! 
Hast thou no words ? 

CLEONE 

I know not what thou mean'st ? 



SCENE IV.] SAPPHO. 91 

SAPPHO 

Know'st not and weep'st ? Hold up thy head if 

innocent, 
Take off this gay attire, these flowers that 
Do scarcely hide the serpent coiled beneath them ! 
Give me that wreath in memory of thy love. 
Why dost thou spare the rose upon thy bosom ? 
In vain thou strivest ; give me the rose. 

cleone (crossing her hands on it) 

ISTo, never! 
My life, rather my life ! 

sappho (drawing a dagger) 

Thy life is mine. 
Give me the rose or die. 

CLEONE (falling on her hiees) 

gods ! gods ! 

PHAON (entering) 
Who calls upon the gods ? A dagger drawn ! 

SAPPHO 

The rose upon her breast the slave refused me. 

PHAON 

And she did well. Thou hast no right to take 
From her the rose I gave her in remembrance 
Of love that youth and innocence inspired, 
And which outweigh a thousand times the laurel 
When it entwines the faded brow of Circe. 



92 SAPPHO. [act tii. 

SAPPHO (letting the dagger fall) 
Phaon ! 

PHAON 

I'll listen not ! Thy tears are false. 
Turn not thy pitying eyes on her, Cleone ; 
False as her hand, her eyes will kill. 

CLEONE 

She weeps. 

PHAON 

Away ! she weaves new charms wherewith to slay. 

[Exit CleonI 

Sappho (falling at Ms feet) 

Phaon ! Phaon ! Why this cruelty ? 
What have I done to thee ? 

phaon 

The dagger drawn. 

SAPPHO 

1 drew it not before I saw — 

PHAON 

Saw what ? 

SAPPHO 

Thee place the roses in Cleone's bosom. 

PHAON 

Sappho, thou liest. 

SAPPHO 

By the gods ! I saw 



SCEN'E IV.] SAPPHO. 

Thee lavish flowers and kisses on my slave. 
'Twas in the cabinet of the Tyrant. 



PHAON 

Liar ! 



SAPPHO {drawing her dagger} 
By all the gods that make Olympus sacred, 
Thon shalt not say that word again and live. 
Plebeian ! have a care, lest down to Tartarus 
I dash thy perjured soul. 

PHAON 

Cleone, bo ! [Re-enter Cleone. 

sappho {throwing mcay the dagger) 

Phaon ! Pbaon ! canst forget so soon 
Thy holy vows before Olympian Jove ? 
Dost thou not fear Apollo's angry darts ? 
The dread Eumenides thou didst invoke ? 

phaon 

1 nothing fear except thy murderous dagger. 

SAPPHO 

I was mad, Phaon. 

PHAON 

Mad ! and art mad still ! 

BAPPHO 

Not mad, but dying of the heart-ache. 



94 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

cleone" (kneeling) 

Sapplio ! 

phaon (pulling her away) 
Touch not the aspic ! It will sting to death ! 
Come hence, dear child, the dagger made thee free, 
The presence of the dragon let us flee ! 

[They run out. Sappho stretching forth her hands 
towards them, falls forward. 



SCENE V. 

The garden as in Act III. Scene II. Enter Sappho slowly, with 
her eyes bent on the ground. Alc^eus follows, and pauses in 
the shadows, right. 

SAPPHO 

How still is all around, how mute the air, 

And peaceful the repose of weary Nature. 

Ah ! could I know such rest, sleep like these birds, 

In sweet embrace of unembittered Hymen ! 

Alas ! such sleep will never more be mine ! 

The blissful slumbers of the nuptial pillow, 

The golden-pinioned dreams that hover round 

The marriage couch with love have flown for ever. 

Whilome, I closed the portal of my heart, 

Upon its fires piled a&hes of dead dreams, 

So high they could not stir beneath the weight ; 

Then with this smouldering iEtna in my bosom, 

I struggled up the rugged steep of fame, 

And from the summit plucked the deathless laurel : 



SCENE v.] SAPPHO. 95 

How proud was I upon that festive day ! 
How calm! how self-possessed! how great ! 
My soul had conquered, the world lay at my feet, 
And to the gods I felt myself akin. 

alcjeus (aside) 
Had I possessed a thousand lives that day, 
I'd given them all to save thee from thy fate. 



SAPPHO 

Kings, kingdoms, diadems I did refuse 

For him — a thought ! it lightens through my soul ! 

To Lesbos I will send Cleone back. 

There in my palace, locked, she will forget, 

And be forgotten. What ! if he follows her. 

Then banish reason, gods ! and make me dumb 

Alike to joy and sorrow ! 

CLITUS (entering softly) 
ye gods ! 
Help me to break to her the heavy news ? 
Apollo's darling. [To Sappho. 

safpho 
Clitus, art thou here ? 
1 was about to call thee, and unfold 
A thought just born of my great agony. 
Swift man my galley, take Cleone home, 
And iu my palace lock her from the world. 

CLITUS 

Sappho, great Sappho — 



96 SAPPHO. [act hi. 



SAPPHO 

What ! dost thou refuse ? 



CLITUS 
My life I'd give to serve thee. 



SAPPHO 

What is 't then ? 



CLITUS 

Alas ! dear Muse, they've flown. 



SAPPHO 

Flown ! Whither gone ? 

CLITUS 

To Sicily. 

SAPPHO 

To Sicily ! When ? How ? 

CLITUS 

In the Royal Appins, speeded by the Tyrant. 

SAPPHO 

Pisistratus ! Art sure of it ? 

CLITUS 

Ay, Muse. 

SAPPHO 

O hell ! are all thy fiends unchained at once ? 
Away ! arouse my slaves ! take each a brand, 
And stealthy as the devil creeps to mischief, 



SCENE v.] SAPPHO. 97 

Set fire to Athens, burn her to the ground ! 
If by her Tyrant's hand this heart must die, 
It shall find sepulchre in her proud ashes. 
Away ! no, stop ! first bid my soothsayer hither ; 
Then tell the Tyrant I would speak with him. 
Now go ! not hobbling, but as lightning speeds ! 

[Exit, violently pushed. 
How have I fallen ! from what mighty height ! 

[To Soothsayer, entering. 
What tidings from the Oracles dost bring me ? 
Why standst thou pale and trembling, like a coward ? 
Speak out, ere my soul's lightning strike thee dead ! 

SOOTH. 

Thy Phaon with Cleone 's gone for ever. 

SAPPHO 

For ever ! Gone for ever ! Say thou liest ; 
That Phaon still is here, and loves but Sappho. 

SOOTH. 

To Sicily they've gone to live and love. 

SAPPHO 

Gods ! what is left for Sappho ? 



SOOTH. 



Leucate. 



SAPPHO 

Leucate ! Get thee gone, ere I go mad ! [Exit Sooth. 
Jealousy, murder, robbery, and lust, 
The horrid brood of hydra-headed sin 
That from the deep abyss of flaming hell 

H 



98 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

Infect this world with poison-breathing breath, 

Are crimes that blanch the cheek and freeze the blood ; 

But there another is, whose deadly hues 

In contact brought with them, turns them to snow : 

It is adultery : alone it does 

"What all the others do in combination : 

It steals — it lies — deceives — it swears false oaths, 

Betrays, stabs, slays whole hecatombs of hearts. 

pisisteatus (entering) 
Art thou declaiming for the Dionysia ? 

SAPPHO 

Didst ship my slave by right of usurpation, 
As thou dost wear the diadem of Athens ? 

PISISTEATUS 

Not I, but Phaon. 

SAPPHO 

Phaon ! She's my slave. 



She's Phaon's now. 



PISISTEATUS 
SAPPHO 

And Phaon's mine, by Heaven 



He's mine ! 



PISISTEATUS 

He is Cleone's. 



SAPPHO (with draiun dagger) 

Tyrant ! mock 
Me not, lest thou dost learn that I can kill 
A king. 



SCENE v.] SAPPHO. 99 

pisistratus (aside) 

By Jove ! she hath Achilles' fire ; 

I like it. 'Twill be useful to the State. [To Sappho. 

Forgive my raillery ; I am thy friend, 

And would not pain thy great heart for my kingdom. 

sappho (falling at his feet) 
My friend, dost say my friend ? And thou wilt bring 
My Phaon back ? My heart of heart. My life ! 

do ! do ! and I will be thy slave. 

pisistkatus (lifting her to his bosom) 
Thou shalt not be my slave, but honoured queen, 
The brightest jewel in my diadem. 
Let Phaon go to Sicily, and dwell 
There with Cleone, whom he loves as but 
The young can love the young and beautiful, 
Forget the peasant and be twice a queen. 

sappho (recoiling) 
If thou didst proffer me a diadem 
Sown with as many gems as heaven with stars, 
And every brilliant in it were a sun 
Eclipsing a million times the god of day, 

1 would not doff the laurel-crown to wear it — 
Enthrone Caesura ! seek no other queen. 

PISISTRATUS 

I'd rear no kings from that accursed stock, 
Her father, standing 'twixt me and the throne, 
Proffered to step aside if I would wed his 
Daughter. 

H 2 



] 00 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

SAPPHO 
That man's a coward who would make 
A woman's heart a stepping-stone to power. 

PISISTRATUS 

Vile courtesan of Lesbos, hence from Athens ! 

sappho (rushing at him with drawn dagger) 
Coward ! take back that hell-born word ! 

pisistratus (dashing her off) 

Away ! 
Impious Muse ! 

alc^ius (rushing forward) 

Ungallant monarch, draw ! 
[They go out fighting. Sappho sinks down with 
her head bent forward, and her hands clasped 
in front of her Jcnees. The poets enter severally, 
saying as they pass before her, ' We wish the 
Lesbian joy!' Anacreon reels in, followed by 
Alceus, unperceived. 

ANACREON 

At Olympia Sappho spurned 
All the bards that for her burned ; 
Took to husband blooming Phaon, 
As she took her lyre to play on ; 
But aweary soon of play, 
With her slave he ran away : 
Lesbian, don't bewail the boy, 
I will wed thee still with joy. 
[He attempts to take her hand. Alcleus seizes 
him, and drags him out. Then returns. 



SCENE v.] SAPPHO. 101 

ALC^US 

Sappho, beloved, what can Alcaeus do 
To mitigate the anguish of thy heart ? 

SAPPHO 

Alceeus, good, high-souled Alcaeus, nothing. 
Death and the grave can only serve me now. 

ALCJEUS 

Time medicines the worst of earthly ills. 

SAPPHO 

Ages would not suffice to heal my wounds. 
The jealousies of gods and men have slain me. 

ALC^US 

One sorrow ofttimes swallows up another. 
The young Erinna's dead — slain by thy woes, 
And sudden changed love. 

SAPPHO 

How blessed is she ! 
Her sleep, how sweet ! her rest, how enviable ! 
The woes that crush like mountains in their fall, 
The wrongs that kill can never reach her heart. 
Death's icy sea lies twixt her and all ills. 

RHODOPE (entering) 
baby, baby, courage take, and hope ! 

SAPPHO 

Hope is dead. 



102 SAPPHO. [act hi. 

EHODOPE 

Hope liveth oft when seeming dead, 
Comes back to life when life appears extinct. 
The shipwrecked mariner sometimes finds escape 
By swimming, floating on a plank, or hanging 
Upon a rock amid the howling waves 
Until some unexpected vessel, driven 
Hither by friendly fortune, plucks him off: 
Sometimes the shepherd under shady beech, 
Sounding his pipe, beholds, affrighted but 
Not hurt, the lightning split the tree behind him. 

SAPPHO 

Come to thy meaning by the shortest way. 

EHODOPE 

Of wise Stratonica thou oft hast heard ; 
Her cave, in ivy mantled to the lips, 
Lies in a wood beyond the eastern gate. 
There for deserted lovers she invokes 
The good and evil sprites — and most of all 
The foe of Cupid's mother, Hecate. 
In occult science put thy faith, and come. 

SAPPHO 

My limbs would fail to carry me half way. 

EHODOPE 

I bore thee once about in swaddling clothes, 
And now, methinks, mine old limbs could support 
thee. 

ALC2EUS (aside) 
How crushed is she ; yet like some glorious ruin, 
Beautiful, even in her desolation. 



SCENE v.] SAPPHO. 103 

sappho (rising slowly) 
A thought ! It comes like star out on the storm 
To guide the mariner. I'll to Sicily ! 
And by the laws of Greece reclaim my slave ! 
To Sicily! ha! ha! to Sicily! 

[Exit, followed by Rhodope and Alobus. A scene 
is drawn back, and discovers Athens on fire. 



the curtain. 



104 SAPPHO. [act iv. 



ACT IV. 



SCENE I. 

Sicily. Evening. A lawn near a cottage, lighted by the fires of 
Mtna. Cleone in the attire of a shepherdess, her throat clasped 
by a rich diamond necMet, dancing with shepherds and shep- 
herdesses to the music of Phaon's pipe and other pastoral 
instruments. Glitus and Ehodope enter, disguised, and 
mingle among the dancers. 



CLITUS {drawing ehodope forward) 
In yonder little cottage dwell the lovers. 
It is alone, and all the portals wide. 
Fly to the galley ; bid the Lesbian hither 
To clutch the jewels Phaon stole from her 
To deck the dusky beauty of her slave : 
They all are there, locked in the golden casket, 
Except the diamond necklet that now clasps 
The tawny throat of yon muse-killing aspic. 
That hoary shepherd, leaning on his crook, 
Like a sieve, let all run through him at one tap. 
So straight he led my thoughts into the cottage, 
I there could lay my hand upon the jewels. 
Put thy nose in a cachette in the wall- 
Understand est ? Now, quick upon thy legs, 
While I enchain the revellers here with harping. 

[Exit Rhodope. 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 105 

The lovers are romantic, and like music, 

And by the cunning of mine art I'll hold them 

Until the Lesbian trip their stolen joys. 

[Sets his harp down, and gazes fixedly at Cleone. 
Behold yon swarthy snake ! her little feet 
Now twinkling on the very heart of Sappho — 
The greatest heart Olympus ever launched. 
Is she a thing to pull the eagle down, 
And trail his heaven-fledged pinions in the dust ? 
perfidy ! base ingratitude ! 
Hell has no name that's black enough to fit thee ! 

[He plays. Shepherds gather around him, ex- 
amine his harp, then dance to its music. 



SCENE II. 

The sea shore, lighted by Mtna. Sappho, closely wrapped in a 
long black mantle, and wearing a helmet and visor enters from 
the galley, and walks to and fro. 

SAPPHO 
This is Sicilia ! Theme of Homer's lyre, 
And all so seeming fair one might not deem 
She holds an ^Etna in her heart : Scylla 
And dread Charybdis rend her ears ! It tells 
How fair a brow dissimulation wears : 
That smiles which play upon the lips art oft 
Reflections of volcanic fires beneath. [Pauses. 

Sicilia ! 

Thou art my sister, born to burning woes, 
To speechless sorrows, and volcanic throes. 

[ Walks to and fro ivith her eyes bent on an open 
letter, drops it, and gazes on the volcano. 



106 SAPPHO. [act iv. 

hell of fires ! burning soul that vomitst 
Thy molten woes fall in the face of heaven ! 
Thou dost so stir the lava lakes locked in me, 
Dashest such seething currents through my veins, 
That to dwell with thee much would make me mad ! 
Could I so ope my heart, and strike space blind 
With its red agony, how well were it 
For me. 

Enter Rhodope. 
What news, Rhodope, bringst thy Sappho ? 

EHODOPE 

Why, baby, that in yonder little cottage 
Thou seest nestling 'mong the loving vines 
Thy faithless Phaon and Oleone dwell. 

SAPPHO 

all ye gods, uphold my reeling senses ! 
Am I awake ? Is this the earth whereon 

1 stand, or some fantastic realm of dream ? 
Phaon and love dwell there, and Sappho absent ? 
It cannot be, ye gods ! It cannot be. 

Yenus, beauty of the skies, 
To whom a thousand temples rise ; 
Thou gaily false in gentle wiles, 
And full of love-perplexing smiles — 
goddess ! from my heart remove 
These wasting pangs and pains of love ! 

If ever thou hast kindly heard 
A song in deep distress preferred, 
Hear this ! and from the realms of air, 
Propitious to my tuneful prayer, 



SCENE II.] SAPPHO. 107 

Descend, thou bright immortal guest, 
In all thy radiant charms confess'd. 



Twice thou didst leave Almighty Jove, 
And all the golden roofs above, 
In answer to my Paphian prayer ; 
Thy quivering sparrows clove the air, 
And as they earthward winged their way 
Like harps I heard their pinions play. 

Celestial visitant ! once more 
Thy needful presence I implore ; 
In pity come, and ease my grief, 
Bring my distempered soul relief; 
Quench in this bosom Cupid's fires, 
Or give me all my heart desires. 

Relent ! Unknit thy beauteous brow ! 
Clear up the storms of Hymen now : 
In yonder cottage break the chain 
Of lawless bliss, and let me reign ; 
Give me back Phaon — all his love, 
And never from me let him rove. 



RHODOPE (pulling her mantle) 
Sapphie ! Sapphie ! pray no more to Venus, 
The cruel, jealous, unrelenting goddess, 
But haste with me to yonder little cottage, 
Whose open doors invite thee to walk in 
And take possession of the stolen casket. 
A shepherd at the dance upon the lawn 
Where, now, Cleone's little feet keep time 
To Phaon's pipe, told Clitus where to touch it. 



108 SAPPHO. [act iv. 

SAPPHO 

Mysterious powers that stand behind the veil 
Pending between the present and the future, 
Seeing, unseen, speak out ! and tell me if 
There be in store for me a happy greeting, 
Or if the arrow shall strike deeper home ? 

EHODOPE 

Come, baby, quick, or we shall lose the jewels. 

[Exeunt. 
A Galley heaves in sight, and lands. Aloeus 
disembarks from it. 

ALGEUS 

Thanks to the gods, I am arrived at last, 

Despite the tempests that have held me back 

An hour behind my love ! There is her galley. 

Sappho ! She answers not ; yet is she here, 

The perfume of her presence fills the air 

With incense sweet as breath of Araby. 

What's this ! an open letter on the sand ? [Reads it. 
1 Oh ! couldst thou know the burning pain 
That wrings my heart, and sears my brain ! ' 

'Tis Sappho's hand ! the Lesbian's burning words ; 

[Kisses it. 

O precious jewel that dost tell me I 

Am close upon the footsteps of the Muse ! 

Here are her tiny footprints in the sand ! 

Here has she stood, here told her woes to JEtna, 

And from her red eyes drawn a sea of tears. 

[Throws himself on the sand, and kisses the footprints. 

O sweet impressions ! angelic imprints ! 

Ye have removed whole mountains from my heart ; 



SCENE II.] SAPPHO. 109 

It leaps again, ha ! ha ! its fountains play 

In the bright sunlight of eternal day. 

I am not mad, yet am I something like it, 

This frenzied joyance might have birth in Bedlam ; . 

What ignis-fatuus lures me o'er the sea, 

Following the flight of an inconstant star. 

What is this potent spell that holds me down 

Here like a giant arm ? alas ! Love is 

My conqueror ; these twenty years I've vainly 

Battled with him. Yon crimson hell whose breath 

Blows out the stars, and strikes heaven blind, turns 

pale 
Before the iEtna burning in my heart. \_Eorit. 



SCENE III. 

The interior of tke cottage. Phaon-'s casquette and gloves lying 
on a table — his sword hanging on the wall — music and sounds of 
merriment heard without. Enter Sappho leaning on Khodope. 



SAPPHO. 

O happy threshold that dost kiss his feet ! 
O happy roof that shelterst his dear head ! 
O happy walls that list his loving voice ! 
And are all woof'd and wefted with his smiles. 
Oh ! let me clasp ye, fold ye to my heart, 
And drink death from the poisoned cup of bliss. 
hallowed casquette that dost clasp his brow, 
Lie on my bosom where his heart hath lain 
So oft, discoursing love — the sweets of heaven. 
gloves ! protectors of the beauteous hands 



110 SAPPHO. [act it. 

That held me, swooning, in electric clasp, 
Come to my bosom, too ! Lie there, and talk 
Of joys that were, bliss nevermore to be. 

phaon (entering suddenly) 
Who're ye ? What seek ye here ? 

rhodope (concealing the casket under her mantle) 

We are your friends. 
And seek a gentle greeting. 

PHAON (seeing the cachette open) 

Ho! thief! thief! 

Shepherds rush in followed by Clitus and Oleon^, 
and seize Sappho and Rhodope. 

sappho (tearing herself from them) 
Unhand me, villains ! Keep a peaceful distance. 

PHAON (to SAPPHO) 

What hast thou there ? 

SAPPHO 

Thy casquette and thy gloves. 

PHAON 

Put them where thou didst find them and avaunt ! 

SAPPHO 

Anon. 

PHAON 

What brought thee here ? 



scekb in.] SAPPHO. Ill 

SAPPHO 

Cleone and 
The stolen jewels. 

PHAOX {snatching his sword from the xoall) 
Liar ! thief ! robber ! 

CLITUS {striking up his blade) 

Dastard ! back. 

SAPPHO {throwing up her visor) 
Phaon, behold the thief ! 

PHAON {staggering backward) 

Te gods ! tis Sappho ! 



SCENE IV. 

The Lawn as in Act IV. Scene I. Sappho rushes in dishevelled 
and bleeding, followed by Clitus and Rhodope. 



SAPPHO 
mighty Gods ! avengers of the wronged ! 
Where are your lightnings ? Where your thunder- 
bolts ? 
Have love, humanity, gallantry fled the earth, 
And men put on the shapes of brutish beasts ? 
He smote me with the hand that once caressed me, 
Did curse me with the tongue that swore me love — 
Come death ! Oblivion ! ye are welcome now, 



112 SAPPHO. [act iv. 

Since sacredness no longer holds a place 
Within the sanctuary of man's heart. 

[Sinks down, weeping. 



CLITUS (smiting the ground with his 
Thou dread Apollo ! Guardian of the Muse, 
And swift avenger of the wrongs of men ! 
Hurl double-barbed arrows through his heart, 
And send his perjured soul as far into 
The naming depths of Erebus as he 
Has plunged this child into the sea of sorrow ! 
From damned abodes, terrific Circe come, 
And from the beauteous form that now he wears 
Transform him to a snake, the thing he is, 
And couch him in the arms of green-eyed Scylla, 
Or, licking the dust, let him creep down to hell. 

Enter officers ivith Cleone in chains and Phaon in 
custody, followed by a crowd of shepherds. 

phaon (throwing his arms round cleone) 
To touch this angel let none venture more ! 
Although disarmed, not without arms am I ; 
Each limb in her defence becomes an arm, 
And every arm a giant. Tremble not 
Belov'd ; while Phaon breathes no ill shall touch thee ! 
Villains ! look on this lovely innocent ! 
You men ! and shackle beauty thus ! Gall her 
Sweet flesh ? this only could a woman do ! 
Cleone come with me. 

officer (stepping before him) 
Stir not a step. 



SCENE IV.] SAPPHO. 113 

PHAON 

Am I not free ! Is justice fled the earth ? 

OFFICER 

None are free when a penalty is pending. 

PHAON 

A penalty ! For what ? 

OFFICER 

For slave- stealing. 

PHAON 

Oh ! I will pay the ransom — pay it all ! 

OFFICER 

A criminal should plead, not dictate terms. 

PHAON 

Are you so abject as to aid a monster ? 

OFFICER 

Thee I'll detain, and chain if Sappho bid it. 

PHAON 

Ancient, perfidious man ! dost thou not blush 
Such crouching words to utter. Who is Sappho ? 
Is she the umpire of the world ? 

OFFICER 

Her hest 
Is law. He who could break a woman's soul 
Upon a stolen slave, and to his crime 
Add theft and profanation of her person, 

I 



1 14 SAPPHO. [act iv. 

In witness whereof speak those crimson drops, 
Hath forfeited official clemency. 

PHAON 

Ah ! ha ! old man ! Her Circe charms round thee 
She's woven too ! I'll try her spells again 
On me. 

Officee {stepping before him) 
Aback ! molest not Sappho. 

PHAON 

Thwart me not. 
Toad ! I will learn of what such hearts are made. 
Ah ! ha ! thou tremblst. It is thy turn now 
To quake, and "blanch, and grow weak in the knees ! 
So silent still ! The Poet's lip so dumb ? 
Oh ! throw away thy mask, and be thyself. 
Thou Circe ! killing with thy damned charms, 
By what right dost thou here detain a Greek ? 

SAPPHO 

The right that Greece gives to detain a thief. 
The robbery of a slave is paid with death, 
Give me Cleone or abide the law. 

phaon (startled) 
Dragon ! thy ransom name. 

SAPPHO 

I ask no ransom. 
I claim my slave by right of Grecian law. 

PHAON 

Thy dagger forfeited thy right to her, 
But I will pay thy ransom ! 



SCENE IV.] SAPPHO. 115 

SAPPHO 

With my jewels ? 
Officers, obey my order ; bring Cleone. 

phaon (to officer) 
By touching her you touch upon your death. 

[Falls at Sappho's feet. 

Sappho, Sappho \ is thy bosom stone ? 
Melts it no more to human grief and pain ? 

SAPPHO 

Ingratitude has slain the angel in me. 

1 claim my slave. Cleone must come with me. 

PHAON 

Sappho ! what demon hand hath changed thy heart 

To adamant ? Where is that tenderness, 

That sweet, unfathomed sympathy with love, 

That wove their fatal spells around my life, 

And took Olympus captive ? Look at me ! 

Let me peruse thy face, and see if 'tis 

The wondrous Sappho who bewildered worlds ! 

SAPPHO 

Thou hast destroyed it all. 

PHAON 

'Tis Sappho's voice ! 
Its magic tones I hear. 

SAPPHO (aside) 

He loves me still ! 
i 2 



1 1 6 SAPPHO. [act iv. 

PHAON 

Kims' to the wind whate'er I've done amiss, 

o 

And be to me again the godlike Muse ! 

SAPPHO 

All wrongs I will forgive — forget. 

PHAON 

I knew it ! [Flings his arms round Cleone. 
Give me this child, my light, my life ! 

SAPPHO 

Deceiver ! 

PHAON 

No, that I am not ! By the gods, I'm not ! 

The love I swore thee was not to deceive thee. 

I loved thee, worshipped thee, adored thee, 

Bnt as the gods are loved, adored and worshipped. 

The Lesbian struck the lyre. The world rose np 

To listen. Peasants, poets, seers stood awed, 

And monarchs laid their sceptres at her feet. 

I then an humble, unknown shepherd-boy, 

Untutored in the art of witchery, 

Rose up and listened — worshipped with the rest. 

The music of thy lyre entranced my soul, 

And kindled in my bosom unknown fires, 

The Athenian tyrant lured thee to his court, 

Thee I beheld — inexplicable joy ! 

T told to thee my love. Thy smiles inflamed 

And wove insidious charms around my brain. 

ed for Hymen's chains — thouboundst them on 
me. 
Awhile their charmed weight intoxicated, 



SCENE IV.] SAPPHO. 1 1 

Then brought my heart a vague uneasy thirst 
The ocean of thy love refused to slake. 
If blame attach, proud muse, it is to thee. 
Thou wert a full-grown woman, sane in mind, 
And learned in sorcery — I, a boy, and mad — 
Drunk on the amorous music of thy lyre. 
My boyish flame thy duty was to quench, 
Xot feed with fatal fuel. Know, sad Lesbian, 
That unions of such elements composed, 
Like hot embrace of Auster w T ith Aquilo, 
Have no adhesive qualities to hold them, 
And that the equal only truly love. 
When first I looked upon this lovely child — 
Sweet lily in the valley of my life — 
Lifting her modest head no higher than 
Her native vales, the fountains of my heart 
Burst forth. Cleone, dearest, plead our cause, 
Unveil the liquid mirror of thine eyes, 
That she within thine angel breast may look, 
And all thy deathless love for Phaon see. 

cleoxe (kneeling) 
Sappho, sweet muse ! 

SAPPHO 

Ungrateful slave ! arise ! 

CLEONE 

Sappho, Sappho ! generous, godlike Sappho ! 
Kill not thy child ; but give her light, life, Phaon, 
Dearer than life ! 

SAPPHO {seizing her with drawn dagger) 
Sweet, smooth-tongued adder take 
Thy venomed tooth from out my heart, ere I 
Uncage thy damned soul ! 



18 SAPPHO. [act iv. 



PHAON 

Hold ! Murderess ! 



Drasron ! 



SAPPHO 

Plebeian ! ditch-born repfcile ! hence ! 
To take thy trial at the bar of Jove ! 
O Gods ! I'm mad, and know not what I do. 

[Throws away the dagger, and falls at Phaon' S /eel 
Phaon, forgive this frenzy ; kill me not. 
For me there is no earth, no heaven, but thee — 
No joy, no light, no life. [Joins their hands. 

To thee I give Cleone — take the child, 
And in the hnmblest corner of the cottage 
Accord to me a resting place that I 
May see thee, hear thee, do thee menial service. 
do ! do ! and all my gold is thine. 

PHAON (smiting her) 
The she- wolf would I shelter, but not thee ! 
Hold off thy hands, thy touch is venomous ! 
Off ! Off ! coil not thy folds around me ! 

SAPPHO (clinging to him) 

Phaon ! 
Phaon ! kill me not ! kill me not yet ! 

[Clitus tears her from, him, and stretching his 
trembling hands above him, cries. 

CLITUS 

Enmenides ! dread avengers come ! 
With lambert curses pin this twain to earth 
Fast as the rivets of Promethian chains 
Bit down into the rock of Caucasus ! 



SCENE IT.] SAPPHO. 119 

With hell-begotten breath melt their fine flesh, 
And fling the ashes to the howling winds ! 
Down in these hollow bosoms where now sit 
Their iron bound hearts let slimy reptiles bask, 
And croaking ravens build their brooding nests ! 
Eumenides, Eumenides, appear ! 

[The Furies rush in with blazing breath. Clitus 

and Rhodope bear Sappho out, right, swooning. 

Alcmtjs enters, left, followed by sailors and 

shepherds. 

ALC^US 

Miscreant ! robber ! dastard ! where is Sappho ? 

phaon (springing up) 
Gone to hell, I hope ! 

ALC^US 

Perfidious villian ! draw, defend thyself ! 

[They fight; Phaon falls. 

PHAON 

Oh, I am slain ! Cleone, I am slain ! 
O gods ! what agony, what agony ! 
Come with me, child ; there's bliss beyond the grave ! 

[Dies. 

cleone" 
O Phaon, Phaon ! leave me not alone ; 
Come back ! speak, speak ! He moves not, he is cold. 
gods ! he's dead ! Strike me dead too, ye Furies ! 
Swift on your flaming breath send me to Hades, 
To join my love, my only friend on earth ! 

[The Furies breathe on her. She falls on Ms body. 
Dies. 

THE CURTAIN. 



120 SAPPHO. [act v. 



ACT V. 



SCENE I. 

Ionia. The promontory of Leucate. Interior of the temple of 
Apollo. A statue of the god, centre, in the attitude of having 
just sped an arrow. Suppliants kneeling around it. Bar- 
barians laying offerings at its feet. A high-priest with flowing 
beard and snowy leeks, encircled by the sacred laurel, seen 
sacrificing at an altar. Enter Sappho, closely veiled, and 
followed by Clitus and Rhodope. Jt iih a mien of awe she 
approaches the altar. 



SAPPHO 
Priest of Apollo, deign to hear my prayer, 
Who, urged by fate and obscure oracles 
Over the dangerous sea am hither come 
To learn from thee the potent will of heaven, 
And from this god implore benignant favours. 

high priest (turning sloivly round) 
Tell me what favour of this god thou beggest. 
Surely a maid like thee comes not to pray 
The god for skill in vibrating the arrow 
Like warriors ; nor implore his fruitful warmth 
Like agricultors ; nor bewitching gift 
Of lancinating animals with music 
As harpers, minstrels oft are wont to do ? 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 121 

SAPPHO 

no ! far different is mine errand hither. 



HIGH PRIEST 

Thou seekst, perchance, within the sacred bath 
Of Leucate to cure thyself of some 
Unconquerable malady of love ? 

SAPPHO 

Well hast thou guessed the object of my mission. 

HIGH PEIEST 

Thy name and country, the history of thy woe, 
Ere I invoke the god, I needs must know. 

SAPPHO 

Alas ! I am the ill-starred maid of Lesbos, 

HIGH PRIEST 

The Lesbian Muse ? 

SAPPHO 

Alas ! the Lesbian Sappho, 
Summoned to Athens by Pisistratus 
With loftiest poets to contest the laurel, 
Which unto me was lawfully adjudged. 
I met a youth — the Aclonean Phaon — 
And in my heart received the fatal arrow. 

HIGH PRIEST 

Was thy love chaste, and of the gods approved ? 



122 SAPPHO. [act v. 

SAPPHO 
As chaste as snow that never touched the earth, 
And at Olympian altars sanctified, 

HIGH PRIEST 

What came between thee and thy Paphian lord ? 

SAPPHO 

My slave. 

HIGH PRIEST 

Thy slave ! 

SAPPHO 

My little slave, Cleone. 



Alas ! alas ! 



HIGH PRIEST 



SAPPHO 

I loved her as my child ; 
Him as the gods. To Sicily they fled, 
Abetted by Pisistratns, the Tyrant, 
Who willed to place his crown upon my head, 
And maddened by defeat, struck at my heart 
This dreadful blow. 

HIGH PRIEST 

infamous ! most foul ! 

Sappho (kneeling) 
Venerable man ! sage servant of the gods ! 
Ambassador of Jove, and priest of Phoebus ! 
Who in the ledger of thy memory 
Hast registered a thousand tales of woe, 



SCENE I.] SAPPHO. 123 

And knowest Low to judge aright the heart, 
Judge me, and lay my cause before Olympus. 
Bare to celestial eyes this bleeding bosom 
That never dreamed revolt against the godhead, 
Or nursed infringement of its smallest precept. 
Naked present my soul before its judges, 
That they may see how much too large it is 
For its allotted orbit. Its necessity 
To tread the broader circuits lying outward, 
And, therefore, comprehend why 'tis thus bruised 
And broken, and why this fabled bath I seek. 
If I have erred 'twas not from wish to run 
Counter to sacred law, but want of light- 
More light to lamp the ways that lead to heaven. 
Pitying my woe, then, with these waters quench 
The flame that, like a fiery serpent, lies 
Coiled in this breast, this dreadful heartache ease, 
Quicken these veins, revive this dying pulse, 
Tinge these pale cheeks, give light to these dim eyes, 
And nimbleness to limbs once like the fawn's. 

HIGH PEIEST 

The sacred bath of Leucate alone 
Doth in it hold the power of renovation. 
Descend therein — be healed — rejuvinated. 

SAPPHO 

Since such sweet audience to my prayer thou givest, 

Explain to me the nature of this bath 

For which the oracles have sent me hither, 

And in which thou dost put such wondrous faith. 

Unfold to me the powers wherewith it quenches 

The fires of Cupid, and a heartache ends 

That neither foreign climes, nor prayers, nor tears, 

Nor filling of the world with sighs can ease. 



124 SAPPHO. t [act v. 

HIGH PRIEST 

This would I do if power to me were given, 
For I do pity thee with all my heart. 
Arise, ill-fated Muse, and follow me, 
And I will show to thee the bath wherein 
Lovers, not less afflicted than thyself, 
Have plunged, and quenched the gnawing fires of 
Cupid. [Exeunt Omnes. 



SCENE II. 

A little jetty, reached by a secret path leading from the temple. 
The white rock of Leucate, jutting out over the sea. Enter 
High Priest, followed by Sappho, Cutus, and Ehodopb. 



high priest (pointing to the rock) 
Thou seest yonder snowy promontory 
Jutting out o'er the sea. That is the rock 
Of Leucate. From it Deucalion 
To cure himself of love for matchless Pyrrha ; 
Phobus, Phocension of the house of Codrus, 
And Cephalus, the son of Dyonesus, 
And sad rejected lover of Ptaola, 
To heal love's wounds headlong impetuous leaped. 

SAPPHO 

wretched me ! Is this the sighed for cure ? 
Ah ! what else can it bring to me but death, 
Since, knowing not the swimmer's art, I'll sink 
A prey to dreadful monsters of the sea ? 



SCENE II.] SAPPHO. 125 

HIGH PRIEST 

Why carnst thou to this place thus unsubmissive ? 
Have faith ! 

SAPPHO 

wretched me ! wretched me ! 
Death, ghastly death, stares at me from the waves. 

HIGH PEIEST 

Let fear not overcome thy wits ! From thence 

Deucalion, and Cephalus, and Pbobus, 

Whose names and feats are written on yonder rock, 

For benefit of chicken-hearted bathers, 

Putting their whole trust in the gods, did leap, 

And came forth healed and free from amorous pangs 

As they had drunk the sea of Lethe dry. 

SAPPHO 

To me the gods will prove not thus propitious ! 

HIGH PRIEST 

Submission wins the favour of the gods. 
If, with a mind confiding in them wholly, 
Unwavering and undoubting, thou dost leap, 
Thou mayst expect a most auspicious exit. 

SAPPHO 

Attend me to the brink of yonder rock ; 
Thy holy presence will inspire me strength. 

HIGH PRIEST 

This are the servants of the gods forbidden. 
Shut the door of reason, east out fear and doubt, 
Gird up the sinews of thy soul with faith, 



126 SAPPHO. [act v. 

Ascend the rock, fly to the brink, and leap, 
While on my knees I'll supplicate the gods 
To bring thee from the waters healed and cooled 
As from salubrious bath in summer time. [G> 



SAPPHO 

Stay, holy man. Leave me not yet ! Leave me 

Not yet, but say — If in this sea I leap, 

And Fate decree I never issue thence, 

Whither shall I go ? In what strange world abode ? 

What shape assume ? What likeness there put on ? 

HIGH PE1EST 

Such knowledge gods withhold. 

SAPPHO 

Then do we need 
A higher godhead ! [Thunder. 

HIGH PEIEST 

Impious woman, list ! 
The anger of the gods ! 

SAPPHO 

I bide their wrath. 
Unfold to me the mysteries of that world 
To which all go, and from which none return. 
The grave — is it a couch of dreamless sleep, 
Or one on which some future morn will break ? 

HIGH PEIEST 

Seek not to know the secrets of the gods 

Lest with just wrath they strike thee from this world. 

[Exit. 



scene n.] SAPPHO. 127 

SAPPHO 
Woe ! woe ! woe is me ! None give the key 
That opes the portal of eternity ; 
And, like the blind, I hence mnst grope my way 
With rayless eyeballs, feeling for the day ! 

[Exit, followed by Clitus and Rhodope. 



SCENE III. 

The rock of Leucate. The sea seen beyond. A tablet near the brink 
of the rock on which is writ, 'Deucalion, Cephaetjs, and 
Phobus leaped from this rock to cure themselves of love, and 
came forth healed.' Sappho enters with a timid step, followed 
at a distance by Ceitus and Ehodope. She pauses an instant 
before the tablet. Approaches the brink, looks over, and starts 
back with a shriek. 



SAPPHO 
Horror ! horror of the world of horrors ! 
The flames of Tartarns flashed in mine eyes ! 
Demoniac visions, writhing sonls stretched ont 
On lakes of fire with crimson eyeballs stared 
Me blind, and rent my ears with horrid shrieks. 
When reason reels how vast's imagination, 
How wonderful the worlds it conjures up, 
It rolls the ocean from his coral bed, 
And bears the flaming heart of hell beneath. b csJlxJ) 

\She approaches the brink again, and starts bach. I 

Woe ! woe ! woe is me ! woe is me ! 
I cannot of myself let go this world, 
And trust to that of which I know nought of ; 



128 SAPPHO. [act v. 

Yet must I do it ! It is Fate's decree ! 
Ionian hills, and blue-eyed heavens, give ear ; 
Hearken, hearken to my dying plaint ! 
I stand alone upon the shores of time 
A pendulum vibrating twixt two worlds 
That know me not. Bards who sued at my feet, 
Monarchs who paved my way with diadems, 
With love and glory turned their faces from me ; 
Olympian smiles that wreathed my path whilome 
Are in the hour of my dread need withheld : 
The courage that spurned giants from its way, 
As if they had been overweening pigmies ; 
The faithless currents of my veins have flown, 
My very pulses have forsaken me, 
And left me like a fallen leaf adrift 
Upon the river of oblivion. 

The sorrows I have known have found no tongue, 
The raptures I have felt I've faintly sung : 
Words were too weak to hold the inspiration 
With which the chalice of my soul o'errun. 
And like sweet dew it back to heaven exhaled ; 
But on the brow of time I've writ my name 
Beyond the power of wrong to stamp it out, 
Or envy to obliterate its glory ; 
Ages unborn shall laud the Lesbian lyre. 
Sages and children lisp the songs of Sappho, 
While leaning from some star I'll list their praises. 
Mine error speaks : of the gods I asked too much : 
[ asked the laurel and the myrtle twined : 
They gave the laurel, but refused the myrtle, 
And to their will submissively I bow, 
Forgiving mortals and immortals now. 

; halo of light encircles her as she ivalJcs back- 
ward loivards the brink. 



SCENE III.] SAPPHO, 129 

Eternity is opening on my vision, 

Millions of white hands beckoning me away — 

Adieu ! Adieu ! This is the last of earth ! 

[She turns, and leaps into the sea. Cirrus rushes 
over after her. Ehodope, tearing her hair, 
hobbles to the brink. Alcjeus, crying ' Sappho ' 
comes running up ilie rock, folloived by his 
sailors. 

ALdEUS 

Where's Sappho ? where the prize of Greece ? 

RHODOPE 

There, drowned ! 
Alcasus drowned, and dead ! 

ALCiEUS 

The Lesbian drowned ? 
Millions of Leucate's could drown her not ! 
The Lesbian dead ! that Sappho cannot die 
Is written in the book of destiny. 

[Struggles with sailors. 
Avaunt ! all mortal presence now is odious ! 
Hold off your hands ! What now is life to me ? 
My lamp's gone out, my beacon set for aye ! 

RHODOPE 

Let us embalm her memory with sweet tears ! 

ALCtEUS 

Had I an ocean I would pour them out ! 
I loved the Lesbian more than Jove, than life ; 
Weep mother earth ! weep thy most gifted child ! 
Weep, ye rocks ! Ionian hills lament ! 
K 



130 SAPPHO. [act v. 

And all ye heavens put on the weeds of woe. 
Withered is the laurel, shattered is the lyre : 
Bat as the living lightnings light the sky, 
Its deathless fires shall lume eternity ! 
Upon the earth there was no home for Sappho, 
And with the angels she has gone to dwell. 

[Sappho's spirit, on angeVs wings, appears above the 

briiik. 
Look ! look ! behold her spirit clothed in light, 
Heaven-pinioned, winging its immortal flight ! 
Open the windows of this house of clay ! 
And give my soul egress ! None will obey ! 
(Stabs himself.) 'Tis done ! O gods ! and I am on 

my way 
To join the Lesbian in the realms of day. [Dies. 



TABLEAU* SOLEMN MUSIC. THE CURTAIN. 



EPILOGUE.] SAPPHO. 131 



EPILOGUE. 

The Muse, whose tale ye'd learned from classic pages. 

And only seen through mists of distant ages, 

So dim and far she seemed a fabled sprite, 

Moving upon life's stage ye've seen to-night ; 

A creature like yourselves of flesh and blood, 

With the same passions, hopes, and fears imbued. 

The queen of song, ye've seen the poets greet 

Her as their peer, kings suing at her feet. 

Upon Olympus' highest summit stand, 

Amid applauding Greece serene and bland, 

And to a brainless shepherd give her hand ; 

Then roving down the vales of dark despair, 

A moaning maniac, tearing her long hair, 

By evil spirits towards destruction driven, 

And calling on the god whom heaven had not yet 

given. 
Ye've seen her stand amid the pitiless storm 
Of fate, encircled by no loving arm, 
By height and depth of soul removed as far 
From human sympathy as some lone star, 
Or comet burning its mysterious way, 
And mid it all have only heard her pray 
For light to guide her toward Olympian day ; 
Then turn deaf ears to envy's classic lies, 
And judge her by the senses of your eyes. 



132 SAPPHO. [epilogue. 

Matrons and maids ! All who have truly loved ! 
Whose lovers, husbands, all have faithful proved, 
Whose watchful cares, and smiles, and godlike worth, 
Have made your homes the Edens of the earth, 
Think of the wife desert, the loved one flown, 
And make the ill-starred Lesbian's case your own : 
Freely and tenderly let your heart founts flow, 
And help her as you can to bear her woe. 
Drive slander from your doors, it is a thief 
That brings its thousands every day to grief ; 
Falsehood abashed, from social altars send, 
And with true hearts a sister's cause defend. 
Remember Sappho lived in other times, 
When Jove rewarded virtue, punished crimes ; 
When woman had no friend to take her part, 
And calm the troubled waters of her heart, 
To lend a patient ear to all her woe. 
If wrong assail you now to Christ ye go ; 
Who turns you not away on any grounds, 
But pours the balm of Gilead in your wounds. 



LONDON : PRINTED BY 

SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE 

AND PARLIAMENT STREET 



Just published, Third Edition. 

The King's Stratagem; 

OR 

THE PEARL OF POLAND, 

.A. TRAGEDY I2ST FIVE ACTS. 

By STELLA. 



OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 

'"The King's Stratagem" has symmetry, grace, and tender- 
ness ; and a strongly accentuated individuality ; and is worthy 
of the reputation of La Stella.' — Home Journal. 

' It complies with all the conditions of legitimate tragedy.' 

(London) Examiner. 

' It is a play more fitted for the study than the stage.' 

Westminster Eeview. 

' " The King's Stratagem," from the pen of a gifted lady, 
under the nom de flume Stella, brings out into deep relief the 
terrible nature and punishment of crime, and the ennobling 
effects of true, constant love.' — Victoria Magazine. 

' " The King's Stratagem " was intended for the stage, and 
with good acting would be popular, as there is no lack of inci- 
dent, and the story affords plenty of opportunities for theatrical 
effect. The plot turns upon the loves of Christine, the Pearl 
of Poland, and Milo : the king of the country has the hero 
assassinated in order to steal his bride, but she is saved from her 
intended fate, and retribution falls upon the ravish er. The best 
passage, as far as writing is concerned, is the bishop's speech in 
the last scene of Act I.' — (London) Graphic. 

' It is not often that we have seen anything so exquisite as 
this five-act tragedy.' — Saturday Review. 

' A tragedy of undoubted energy and merit.' 

Illustrated Review. 

' "The King's Stratagem ; or the Pearl of Poland," is dedi- 
cated to those who "believe in the intervention of Heaven 
between mortal belligerents." We have ourselves looked through 
its pages, and confess there is much to ward off dulness. Al- 
though the piece is professedly " a tragedy in five acts," there 
are scenes of excellent comedy sometimes appearing unexpectedly 
in the midst of more serious matter. Eor instance, we have a 
dialogue between Stanislas, Bishop of Cracow, who is supposed 
to be afflicted with a grief which has turned his hair suddenly 
white, and his servant Jean. The circumstances are sombre 
enough in themselves, but the author has managed to treat them 



with much lightness and vivacity. We think our readers may 
now form some idea of the peculiar and quite exceptional 
qualities to be found in a very curious volume. We could wish 
that poetry would, at least, be always as amusing as the " Pearl 
of Poland."' — Globe. 

' " The King's Stratagem " is a tale of love and crime 
forcibly conducted to its tragic denouement. The plot is clearly 
conceived, the scenes well posed, and the characters drawn with 
a vigorous hand. The tone is high, and scattered through the 
piece are passages where the language rises to dramatic dignity.' 

Worcester Journal. 

' " The King's Stratagem," from the pen of Stella, the most 
talented of the American poets, is a dramatic version of one of 
the most tragic incidents of Polish History. It is full of 
striking positions, and if well put upon the stage would be 
popular.' — Rhyl Record. 

' " The King's Stratagem ; or the Pearl of Poland" (second 
edition), is marked by skill of execution and a keen eye toward 
dramatic effect.' — New York Independent. 

'An American lady, La Stella (Estella A. Lewis), now 
living in England, has published through the house of Trubner 
& Co., of London, a poem entitled "The King's Stratagem; or 
the Pearl of Poland." It is a tragedy in five acts, and relates the 
story of Boleslas II. , King of Poland ; his abduction of Christine, 
the "Pearl of Poland," and daughter of Stanislas, Bishop of 
Cracow, upon the eve of her marriage with Pierre Milo, a 
Polish nobleman ; and the means resorted to by the bishop to 
effect the release of his daughter from her imprisonment in the 
royal palace. The book is dedicated " to those who love truth 
and justice, and believe in the intervention of Heaven between 
mortal belligerents." In the poem Heaven is represented as 
alarmed at the crime committed by the King of Poland, and it at 
once sends to earth the ghost of Pierre Milo, who was murdered 
on his nuptial night by the favourites of the king, to assist in 
restoring Christine to her father. Says the poetess in her 
prologue : — 

" To lift up Truth from under Perjury's heel, 

Behold the sepulchre her gates nnseal ; 

Dead bones around them wrap their dust and walk, 

And stand before a mighty king and talk." 

' While the poem proves to be an interesting narrative, and 
many of its passages are meritorious, the ghostly element is 
rather too strong, even for people with active imaginations, who 
do not object to ghosts. Physiologists, and others curious in such 
matters, will be interested in reading of the manner in which 
Milo left his grave : — 

" I stood right on the border of the grave 

And looked down in the coffin, which was lidless, 

And saw with my two eyes wide open, sire — 

Wide open— and clear of vision as they're now — 

The fine dust stir, then rise like ashes when 



A softly breathing zephyr blows into them ; 

Then settle back upon the dry white bones, 

And take the form of purple-threaded gauze, 

Whose fairy meshes 'gan to pulse and throb ; 

And crimson streams, no larger than the veins 

That interline the pinions of a fly. 

Along the violet-latticed rays to roll 

Into a central fountain in the breast — 

Eight in the spot where, sire, once beat the heart — 

The noble, youthful, palpitating heart 

The bosom heaved — the eyes into their sockets leaped, 

Flashing like stars amid the crepuscule— 

The lips did smile — the hair put on its hues — 

And Milo rose — and stood up in the grave ! " 

' The reader will perceive that a woman who ean write like the 
above, is capable of producing a lasting poem No obstacle is 
too great for her to overcome.' — New York Aldine. 

'A new five-act tragedy by the popular authoress of the 
" Kecords of the Heart" is certain to attain a certain amount of 
popularity, whatever its merits may be. 

'The story which she has selected for dramatic treatment, 
although dealing with historical personages, can scarcely be 
deemed to have any foundation in fact, and we cannot help 
thinking that La Stella has lost a legitimate opportunity of pro- 
ducing a good standard drama, both for the stage and the study, 
by introducing incidents not merely impossible, but repugnant 
to reason. The introduction of spiritual agency into the drama 
is, undoubtedly, warranted by high example ; but even Shakes- 
peare does not dare to ascribe the actions of humanity to his 
ghosts — they come and go like guilty thoughts, and any one who 
attempts to go further is in danger of taking that one step which 
separates the sublime from its contrast, is in danger of reducing 
the tragic to the burlesque. Its spectral dramatis jpersonce is 
the one fault we find with " The King's Stratagem." The plot 
is clear, dramatic, and flows swiftly and uninterruptedly to its 
close. The characters —even the minor ones — are strongly indi- 
vidualised ; they are not mere lay figures distorted into all kinds 
of postures to suit the showman's wants ; the language is vigor- 
ous and energetic, and the incidents effective and dignified. The 
difficulty of selecting from a poem — for such title this drama is 
worthy of — is well known ; there are many starry thoughts 
which will serve to sustain, if they do not extend, the reputa- 
tion of La Stella, and many fine sentences beaten out on the 
anvil of imagination ; but disconnected passages no more afford a 
faithful idea of an entire play than did the one brick of the 
Scholasticus show what the house was like. At haphazard, 
however, we take the third scene in the first act, when Stanislas, 
the good old Bishop of Cracow, purposes to confide his only 
child, his beloved daughter, " the Pearl of Poland," to Lord 
Milo:— 

Stanislas. It must be so, alas ! it must be so ! 
This selfish heart mast render np its idol, 
The deified Penates of my household. 
For eighteen years 1'v^been a faithful shepherd, 
Watching the fold of one dear little lamb, 



And fortifying it with love and prayer ; 
For eighteen years have studied how to shield 
Its helplessness against the wind and wave— 
The wolf that is the scourge of bleeding Poland. 

The time is come that asks a change of shepherds. 
(Lord Milo enters.) 
I am so glad, my lord, to meet thee here, 
Where there's no ear but thine and heaven's to hear 
The overflowing of my full-pent heart. 
A solemn matter have I to unfold 
Concerning one of whom thou ne'er hast heard, 
But who is dearer to me than my life. 

Milo (aside). He's going to talk to me about his daughter, 
And thinks I know not of so fair a creature ; 
Dreams not I've scaled. the wall a thousand times 
To see her galloping beneath the limes — 
Lavished upon her charms all powers of art, 
And wear her beauteous image on my heart. 
(To Stanislas.) Thy sweet confessional, my lord, I'll list. 

Stanislas. Milo, my friend, couldst thou a shepherd be ? 

Milo. I've had no practice in the fold, my lord. 

Stanislas. Milo, give ear ! Just eighteen years ago 
God trusted to my keeping a white lamb, 
So tiny, tender, and so beautiful, 
I feared to touch it with my mortal hands. 
For eighteen years I've been its prayerful keeper — 
Tended it, nursed it in my bosom till 
It is become a part of my own life. 
Milo, I want a shepherd for my lamb — 
A tender, watchful, prayerful, loving shepherd." 

' For how Milo accepted the trust gleefully, and for the terrible 
denouement of the tale, we must refer the reader to this remark- 
able work itself.' — Mirror. 



Tenth Edition. Illustrated. 

RECORDS OF THE HEART, 

And other Poems. 
B IT S T IE 31 HI ^ _ 

' The contents of this volume bear no traces of affinity with any of 
the popular schools of recent English poetry. The poetess gives no sign of 
the idolatrous devotion to Shelley or Tennyson or Browning, which fur- 
nishes inspiration to such a host of imitators. Her poems are the utter- 
ances of her inspired soul— original and fresh. In spite of the numerous 
sonnets, which might be supposed to have a personal bearing, it is the 
delineation of human emotion, instead of the egotistic self-revelations, 
which forms the essential charm of these beautiful poems.' — New York 
Tribune. 

' The sonnets in this volume are remarkable for beauty of thought and 
force of expression. Those to " Adhemar" entitle the author to the appel- 
lation of." The Female Petrarch." '— Lamartine (CoursdeLitterature). 

' Stella Lewis is one of the most gifted poetical minds of this country. 
Her celebrity comes not from the writing of sentimental verses and sleepy 
sonnets, but from the composition of some of the most majestic and 
brilliant poems belonging to English literature. She is a poet in the truest 
sense. Her whole nature, her commonest thoughts, her every impulse, her 
life, are based on poetic inspiration.'— New York Sunday Times. 



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